Conjugal Visit
by Kagetora no Tsume
Summary: Warning: Spoilers for Civil War. (Posted here because it's more of an Avengers thing and less a Civil War thing, but still has spoilers.) Vision comes to see Wanda in lockup, and make sure that she is all right after everything that happened. NOW WITH MORE CHAPTERS CAUSE YOU PEOPLE WON'T STOP BEGGING. XP
1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:** Final warning - SPOILERS AHEAD!

* * *

"Are you all right?"

The sudden comment from over her shoulder should have startled Wanda, but she'd grown so accustomed to his visits back at the penthouse, and was so bloody _relieved_ to hear his voice that she didn't so much as twitch.

She glanced over her shoulder, not daring to make a sound for fear that the guards would overhear. She was pretty sure that visitors were not allowed.

Vision stood on the far side of the cell, his left shoulder still partially translucent from where he'd phased through the wall.

"Miss Wanda?" he prompted softly when she did not answer, and she had to look away as she felt tears sting behind her eyes.

He was here. He was actually here, out in the middle of the ocean, checking in on her. It was almost too much to believe.

"Please speak to me," Vision asked, moving to kneel beside the padded shelf that served as her bed. "Are you okay?"

"I've been better," she admitted, unable to meet his gaze, "but I have also been worse. It is...unfortunate but not unbearable."

"I see."

Wanda blinked hard to clear the glassiness from her vision, her gaze following the corner of the cell up to where a tiny camera had been mounted on the wall.

"What about the guards? Will they not be upset that you are here?" she asked.

"I...may have frozen their video feed of your cell."

She let out a breathy laugh, shaking her head.

"Picking up tricks from Tony?"

"I try to avoid the bad habits, but a few slip beneath the radar. What have they wrapped you in?"

"They call it a straight jacket. It is supposed to keep me from moving around," she shrugged as best she could. "Mostly to keep me from using my hands."

"And what is this?" he asked, reaching to trail his finger in a feather-light brush over the band that encircled her neck.

"That is a shock collar. In case I try escaping, or start to make a fuss."

"Like...the ones that the television sometimes displays for rowdy dogs?"

His voice was all innocence, and Wanda could not help the bitter smile that crossed her face as she answered.

"I believe it is the same concept, only far more powerful. It is like having a taser pressed to my throat. It is enough to put me on the ground."

"So it hurts you?"

"A bit," she shrugged, tucking her knees up closer to her chest and wishing she could wrap her arms around them. "If I do not do anything sudden, they do not press it. They usually give me one warning before using the full power. Barton yelled at them the first time when they did not."

"Is that where you got this?" Vision asked, brushing a long strand of hair away from her face so he could better see her throbbing temple. She had not seen the results for herself, as there were no mirrors and the guards did not like when she approached the metal bars across the front of her cell, but the Shrinking Man in the cell next to her had said that it looked bruised.

"I believe that was from Rhody," she shrugged, but then frowned. "How is he...?"

"Better. He is stable, and looks to recover. Although...there have been complications."

"Complications?" she prompted, feeling sick. What had they done?

"The diagnosis is not clear as of yet. Most likely paralysis. His legs."

Wanda looked down, worrying her lip between her teeth. She had only been strapped into this damn jacket for a dozen hours or so, and even losing that little bit of freedom made her feel so utterly helpless that she felt sick with unease. She could not even imagine having to live without the ability to move her legs ever again.

She let out a soft huff, flinching.

This was all their fault. If they had not fought one another...

"Wanda?"

"I am fine," she replied on reflex. "...Just relieved to know that he is alive."

Relieved that she did not have to add his name to the list of deaths they were responsible for. The list of people that she'd helped kill in the name of justice.

"You seem upset," Vision said gently, shifting to sit at her side.

She let out a shuddering breath, glancing up at the ceiling to keep the liquid that was rapidly pooling in her eyes from spilling over.

"It has been a long day. And I am not used to being treated like a violent criminal."

"I'm sorry," Vision murmured. "If there is anything that I can-"

"There is nothing you can do for me. I chose my path knowing this was the result, and you will only find yourself in the same place if you try to help me." She shook her head, glancing up into his pained expression and dragging her composure back together as best she could. "I will be fine as I am."

"Then I will keep you company for a while. If you would like that," he added, more quickly.

Unable to trust her voice enough to speak, Wanda nodded, scooting closer to him as best she could and tucking her head into the crook of his neck as he wrapped an arm about her shoulders. Vision ran a gentle hand through her hair, tucking a loose strand back behind her ear and murmuring "it will be all right."

Wanda let out a shaky breath as he tucked himself close, curling his body around her protectively, and for the first time in hours she let herself relax.

Despite having the others in cells barely a few feet away, she had felt completely alone in her little prison, and having someone actually there was a blessing that she was eternally grateful for.

"Hopefully you will not be here for much longer," Vision soothed. "As soon as this is all cleared up, you can come back to the penthouse."

Wanda nodded, closing her eyes, and pressed herself closer to the artificial warmth of his body. She would love to do nothing else, but she doubted that she was going to be allowed freedom anytime soon.

"Hey! What's going on in here!"

Wanda and Vision both jerked upright at the shout, and Wanda flinched as she felt the warning shock send an agonizing pulse of electricity to her throat where the metal prongs dug into her skin.

"Go!" she hissed, and Vision sank back through the wall as the guard came into view. It took a long second to drag her gaze from where Vision had disappeared, meeting the furious glare of one of the guards as he came to a stop outside of her cell.

"Have you been messing with the cameras, witch?" the guard demanded.

Her eyes widening, Wanda shook her head hard as she heard the others stirring in the cells around her. Not good. Not good, not good, not good...

The guard raised his hand, the shock collar remote in his grip, and she flinched back as she waited for him to press it.

"Who have you been talking to in here?"

Her blood ran cold. The guards had heard the two of them speaking, and for a long few seconds Wanda could do nothing but stare at the remote in apprehension as she scrambled for an answer. How much had they overheard?

She could hear Barton and Sam shouting at the guard to leave her be, and that she was just a kid, but the guard's attention was on her and didn't so much as waver.

"The voices in my head," she murmured at length. "They speak to me and I reply. There is no one here but me."

She watched the guard's thumb circling the button on the remote, tense with distrust as she waited to see whether or not he would believe her. The man tilted his head, considering, and then slowly lowered the remote to his side.

"Very well, witch. I will take your word on it. This time."

Wanda let out a breath, her muscles going slack with relief as she let her head rest against her knees. He had bought it.

She heard the guard take a step back, and glanced up in time to see him raise the remote.

"But don't you even think about causing any trouble!"

With that he pressed the button and Wanda screamed in agony.


	2. Chapter 2

**Author's Note** : Because you people won't stop begging...This was supposed to be a one-shot, but I've tossed a few more chapters together for this. This is the only complete chapter I have at the moment, but I have another in the works that I should be able to post before the weekend.

* * *

"Wanda? Hey, Wanda. Kid, you okay?...Kid?" Clint leaned his head against the wall to listen for her reply, but could hear nothing but her miserable sobs. " _Shit_."

He rubbed a hand over his face as he leaned back against the concrete and let himself slump to the ground. The sound of her scream was still echoing in his ears, and he felt both shaken and helpless. The three of them had been trying to get an answer from her since the guard left, but it had been a few minutes now with no reply, only the sound of her crying in the next cell over.

"Hey, come on, you've got to give us something," Scott called. "You're starting to worry us."

"Wanda?"

"I'm fine," was the watery reply, and Clint frowned.

"You don't sound fine," Scott said, and Clint heard Sam hiss the man's name scoldingly.

"It hurts..."

"That damned collar didn't burn you, did it?" Clint asked, leaning into the door of his cell and trying to see around the corner even though he knew he wouldn't be able to.

"C-can't tell, they have my hands tied," Wanda sobbed.

"Christ..." Clint hissed, clenching and unclenching his hand anxiously.

He was gonna kill someone for doing this to her. Probably Senator Ross.

"Deep breaths, Wanda. You're gonna be okay," Sam soothed. "Just try to calm down, all right? We're gonna get you out of here."

"We _can't_ leave. None of us are _ever_ leaving this horrible place..." Wanda's tone was painfully hopeless, and Clint winced.

She shouldn't be here with them. He should have told her to run when Tony and Vision had rounded them up. It wasn't like either of them could have stopped her.

"Ssh, hey, yes we are," Sam said, his tone low and smooth. "We'll all get out of here, I promise."

"How?"

"We'll think of something," Clint called. "Until then you just sit tight, okay? Like Sam said, deep breaths."

"It's Hydra all over again..."

"We're not gonna let them hurt you," he promised, feeling wretched even as he said it because in his current position there was no way that he could guarantee her of that, and she probably knew as much.

"Yeah, if they wanna mess with you, they'll have to get through the rest of us first," Scott added, and Sam grunted his ascent as well.

This seemed to reassure her somewhat, and Clint heard her take a shuddering breath that she released as a slow, steady one.

"Atta girl, chin up," he encouraged. "You're gonna be just fine. I promise."

"I should have stayed out of it," she murmured. "I should have listened to Vizh and stayed at the compound, and then I wouldn't be in this mess..."

"Hey, listen to me, you made the right choice, okay?" Clint called. "Don't start doubting yourself now. You know you made the right choice."

"...did we?"

"Yes," he replied, forcing as much conviction into his voice as he could. "You know exactly what the world was in for if we hadn't helped Cap and Mr. Guyliner escape. They'll make sure nothing bad happens. You made the right choice to help them."

Wanda mumbled something that sounded like agreement and Clint let out a sigh, glancing up at the plain ceiling for the hundredth time.

God, he hoped they had picked the right side...

"Just hang in there, Wanda," he promised. "I swear I'll get you out of here."


	3. Chapter 3

The sound of dress shoe heels clicking on the metal floors echoed around the room.

Wanda lifted her head from her knees, glancing around. None of the guards wore dress shoes, so this had to be someone important. She just hoped it wasn't Senator Ross. She was in no mood to listen to him right now, and she couldn't trust herself not to lash out at him if given the chance.

The guards had moved her temporarily into a higher security area, as they were unable to get the camera to her cell working again and were suspicious of her tampering with it. She had been here for a few hours so far, curled in the back corner of her cell and missing the sound of the others' voices.

Before she'd been moved, Scott had been trying unsuccessfully to coax Clint and Sam into getting to know one another better with a round of "Never Have I Ever" which apparently required seeing each other's hands, and thus couldn't be played.

Not that she could have played in a straight jacket anyway...

The footsteps stopped at the bars of her cell, and Wanda felt herself tensing as the sudden quiet seemed to swamp the area. She was the only prisoner down here, so it made sense that they would be here to see her, however it was still unsettling. Visitors never meant anything good.

After almost thirty seconds of silence, she risked the barest of glances over her shoulder, and Wanda felt her temper flare.

It was Tony.

The man had a haunted look about him, his eye surrounded by a dark bruise and his face drawn. He was wearing a dress shirt but sporting it in a rumpled, sloppy manner that looked more like a lack of sleep than the careless playboy appearance he usually shot for.

"Wanda," he started, but she cut him off, her tone bitter with disgust as she turned away again.

"Don't talk to me, Stark."

She heard him sigh and take a step closer.

"Wanda, please. I didn't know they were gonna do _this_ to you."

"And what exactly did you think they would do to someone like me? Someone dangerous?" she asked, feeling that he deserved her bitter tone.

Tony was silent for a long moment, and she glanced over one shoulder to try and catch his expression. His face was angled away from her, however, as if he couldn't stand to look, and she felt a frown tug at her lips as she turned her back on him a second time.

The collar rubbed against her jaw as she moved, the edge already starting to leave her skin raw, and she drew her legs a bit closer to her chest as she thought about what she must look like to him. Locked away like an animal, bound and collared. Messy hair with dark bags under her eyes and her mascara still in lines down her face from her tears because she couldn't wipe it away.

She must've looked absolutely wretched.

Behind her the soft hiss of moving cloth indicated Tony shifting his weight.

"I did _try_ to protect you," he said at length, voice soft.

Protect her...what a joke.

She whirled around to glare at him, feeling the thrum of her power in her veins as her anger spiked. In the faint reflection of the bars she could see the red glow of her eyes, and Tony took a sharp step back, fright fleeting across his features.

A jolt from her collar was enough to make her jerk back, gasping in pain, and when she next glanced up through watering eyes Tony was looking at her with pity.

"I'm sorry, Wanda," he said quietly. Then, without another word, he turned around and left.

Gasping for breath as the pain ebbed, she glared after Tony until she could see him no more.

She wanted to blame him.

Hell, she wanted to blame _all_ of them.

She wanted to blame Steve, for getting distracted and nearly getting himself blown up and leaving her to try and contain a live explosion on a whim. She wanted to blame Tony, for confining her to the compound and leaving Vision to guard her because he _knew_ she would rather stay locked up than hurt the android's feelings. She wanted to blame Vision, for doing what Tony said even though his eyes held nothing but regret and sadness as he told her that she was a danger to the public. She wanted to blame Clint for coming out of retirement to drag her into the middle of this argument on the losing side, and she wanted to blame Rhody for taking her out of the fight before she could escape with Steve and Bucky, and she wanted to blame Senator Ross for bringing them the stupid accords in the first place, and she wanted to blame _everyone_ for being idiots and fighting when they could have worked it out without all of this mess...but in the end she could only blame herself.

For being weak. For failing. For being too quick to anger and too easily led astray and not quite fast enough or strong enough or skilled enough to be of any use.

But mostly she blamed herself for going quietly, when she could have escaped at any point up until they had put the collar on her.

She'd cooperated because she hadn't wanted to hurt anyone, and in return they had electrocuted her and locked her in a straight jacket. And now it was far too late. She was stuck here, and she would be lucky if she ever got to see sunlight or take a breath of fresh air again.

Tears welled up in her eyes even as red energy sparked in the air around her, reacting to her helpless rage. It wasn't fair, but there was absolutely nothing that could be done about any of it now.

Wanda was powerless, and she _hated_ it.

She screamed in frustration, and was rewarded with another long hit of searing electricity.


	4. Chapter 4

**Author's Note:** This is really more of an interlude...

* * *

"-and furthermore the conditions there are deplorable."

"I know, Vision, I know," Tony snapped from where he lay on the couch, pressing a bag of crushed ice to his head. The android had been ranting about their friends being trapped at The Raft for the past hour, and as much as he loved Vision, Tony was still nursing some rather painful injuries from his fight in Siberia, and his patience was running thin. "Look, I hate seeing them in there too, but there's nothing I can do about it. My hands are tied. And since Cap and his brainwashed buddy are still out there somewhere, I doubt anyone will be willing to compromise with house arrest for any of them. Especially seeing as the last time we tried that, you got your ass handed to you on a plate."

"Wanda was only aiming to incapacitate me, I'm sure."

"Doesn't matter. She beat you." Tony sat up, wincing, and turned to glance over the back of the couch to where Vision was perched primly on a kitchen stool, his brows drawn. "Which means that she won't be trusted in our custody even if we could get the others out, because she could escape whenever she damn well pleased."

"If she were to sign the accords-"

"And get released the following day? Even if it wasn't a ploy, everyone would assume it was. That won't help anything, and I seriously doubt she'll sign it. Not after all that."

Vision sighed heavily - a trait he'd picked up from Clint somewhere along the line, Tony was sure - and turned to lean on the counter, his head in his hands.

For a long moment neither one moved, and Tony felt a little thread of guilt climb up through his rib cage. It was fairly unusual to see Vision get perturbed by anything, so to see him this distraught was something that Tony found he hated.

"Why don't you go visit her?" he suggested lightly.

The android didn't even look up as he heaved another sigh.

"The last time I tried that, she was punished for my disabling of their video feed. I do not want her to get hurt again."

Tony narrowed his eyes.

"...did you sneak in?"

"..."

"Vision."

"...I may have."

Tony groaned, pressing the ice back against his forehead as he flopped down onto the couch.

"Well, that would be why. People generally don't like when people sneak into prisons and disable video feeds. They probably assumed she was fiddling with their system."

"Please," Vision said softly, a defeated note in his voice that convinced Tony to set the ice aside and sit up again. The synthetic man was looking at him with liquid blue eyes, his brows drawn. "I need to see her. To make sure that she is all right."

Tony sighed, shaking his head and regretting the movement immediately.

"Look...Call up Senator Ross. I can't guarantee anything, but he owes us some favors somewhere along the line, I'm sure. Tell him you want visitation rights. If he says it's family only, just tell him you two are engaged. That's about all I've got."

"Thank you," Vision breathed, hovering up from the stool and levitating for a second before phasing through the floor and out of sight.

Tony stared at the tile where he vanished for a long second before leaning back on the couch.

"No problem, lover boy," he muttered, draping the ice back over his black eye. "Go get 'er."


	5. Chapter 5

Vision hovered through the narrow hallways of The Raft, following a burly, scowling man in a guard uniform as he was led into the main control room.

It had been a mere twenty hours since he had last infiltrated this particular prison to see Wanda, and already he felt like he had been gone for far too long. The people he'd needed to get permission from for an sanctioned visit had been difficult to get in contact with, and even more difficult to convince. In the end, however, he had managed to get authorization for a trip out to The Raft.

The doors to the control room hissed open, and Vision lowered himself to the floor, walking the last few feet so as not to draw unnecessary attention.

Walking was human. Walking was normal.

Despite his attempt at blending, however, the new presence drew every eye in the room, and Vision found himself being scrutinized by a dozen people from behind their monitors. Guards were posted around the edges of the room, and they stared as well, although far more openly.

Vision slowly made his way across the floor, toward the prison access doors.

"Who's this joker?" one of the guards muttered as he passed, and Vision slowed his pace as two of them moved to block his path.

"I am here to visit Miss Wanda Maximoff," he explained.

"Maximoff?" The man who seemed to be in charge of monitoring the doors turned to him, eyebrows up at his hairline."Yeah, no. That one's not allowed visitors."

"On the contrary, I have been directed here by Senator Ross for the sole purpose of seeing her."

"Why do you want to see the crazy one?" one of the men at the security monitors asked.

Vision had to take a moment to parse through a number of answers, none of which were very polite, before replying.

"She is a dear friend of mine. As such, I would like some time alone with her. And I would request that her restraints be removed."

The people at the computers were all openly staring at him now, some of them looking between one another in shock. The guards exchanged glances, and one shook her head.

"No. Absolutely not. She's dangerous, we can't possibly-" she started, but choked her words off mid-sentence when Vision turned a cool look on her.

"I can overpower her if the need arises," he lied rather brusquely. "You have nothing to worry about."

"That's not what we heard," one of the uniformed men muttered darkly. "Last we were told, she kicked your ass without even trying."

Vision narrowed his eyes, mock-studying the man who had spoken.

"And where exactly did you hear this particular piece of information?"

"Rumors have been circling. None of them particularly flattering," one of the people sitting at a computer informed him. "Said she put you down hard. And that you shot down a teammate who dared to attack her."

Guilt flickered sharply within him at the mention of what his moment of distraction had cost Colonel Rhodes, but Vision tried to keep his expression schooled.

"As you know, rumors should never be trusted. Now are you going to let me in, or shall I contact your superiors?"

The man at the door sighed, dragging his hand over his face.

"I'll allow you ten minutes," he said, pointing a finger at Vision. "Not a second more. Understood? Benson, get the keys to the prisoner's restraints."

A dark haired man ducked out of the room, and the others broke into soft murmurs as they turned back to their monitors, shooting him surreptitious glances when they thought he wasn't looking.

The dark haired man returned a moment later, holding a tiny ring with two gold keys on it, and handed them to the door guard. The burly man fixed Vision with a long look before holding out his hand, the keys pinched between his fingers.

"Understand that if there are problems, I will hold you fully accountable."

"Understood," Vision replied evenly, accepting the small key ring.

With that the guards all stepped out of the way, the big one motioning to one of the people behind the monitors, and the heavy steel doors slid open to let him by.


	6. Chapter 6

Wanda glanced up slowly as she heard footsteps.

The echo was loud in the otherwise silent holding bay, and she couldn't help a little wince as it pounded in her head, ears still ringing with the sound of her own ragged breaths. As the source of the footsteps rounded the corner, however, her eyes widened sharply in surprise.

One of the guards was walking toward her, a scowl on his face, but that wasn't what caught her attention. It was the familiar synthetic being hovering a few inches off the ground a pace behind the man that had her focus.

 _Vision_.

He was dressed in his usual "casual" attire - no one had the heart to explain to him that it was, in fact, rather formal, and Wanda rather suspected it had something to do with the fact that he looked so damn good in it - and he was carrying a little dark bag with him.

She could only watch in shock as the guard punched in the key code to open her cell, granting Vision access. The door slid open with a hiss and the synth skirted around the man to enter the cell with her, a gentle, sad smile on his face.

"Vizh," she whispered in shock, sitting up straight.

He was here. He was actually here again, he hadn't forgotten her.

"Hey!"

Wanda's attention snapped to the man who had shown Vision in, her eyes widening when she saw what he held.

"Now don't you go causing no trouble-" the guard started, raising the shock collar remote, but before Wanda could react, Vision had the man's hand in a vice grip.

"You are not to use that on her," he growled, low and deadly, and the guard was quick to back off, eyes wide.

Vision turned back to face her, his features softening as he caught her gaze, and Wanda felt something sharp and hot ache in her chest.

"Vizh," she breathed, her sight swimming as her eyes flooded with tears.

"Hello Wanda," he replied with a gentle smile. "I promised I would not leave for long, didn't I?"

"They let you in," she murmured in wonder, for lack of anything else coming to mind, and Vision offered her a sheepish shrug that she knew he'd picked up from her.

"I figured that I probably should not sneak in, as that is apparently frowned upon."

"Just a bit," she tried to joke, even if it came out flat. "What are you doing here?"

"I've been allowed to visit you," he smiled, slowly crossing the little cell to her side. "Briefly, at least."

Wanda choked out a disbelieving laugh as Vision set his bag down and settled himself at her side, pulling her into a hug as he smoothed the tangles from her hair. She flinched a little involuntarily as his fingers brushed the shock collar, and his face contorted with sadness.

"I am so sorry, Wanda... I never intended for you to get hurt," he said softly.

"I'm just glad to see you," she whispered. "It's lonely down here."

She hadn't realized what a relief the aimless chatter of the guys had been until it had been taken away, and she'd been left to stare at a blank wall in complete silence as the minutes dragged by at an agonizing pace. Left with nothing but her own haunted thoughts for company, she had spent more time than not just trying to keep herself calm so the guards wouldn't activate the collar.

"I'm so glad to see you," she repeated, resting her head on his shoulder. He was mutedly warm beneath her, smelling of wool and salt air, as well as the familiar sharp smell of static that always seemed to hang on his skin, and she breathed it in deeply as her eyes fluttered closed. For a long second they were just still, Wanda trying to press herself into his being just to assure herself that he was really here, not just some image that her subconscious had conjured up.

"Oh, there is one other thing," Vision said softly, his voice rumbling up through his chest into her ear, and Wanda blinked up at him in confusion as he drew back from her. The synthetic man reached into the pocket of his vest, and Wanda tilted her head in curiosity as he withdrew something that glinted in the achingly white prison lights.

Vision held up a small key with a smile, and she could only watch in shock as he leaned close to unfasten the locks for both her straitjacket and her collar.

"It is only temporarily, I am afraid," he said, "but perhaps you can enjoy a little bit of freedom while I am here."

"Vizh..." she whispered, blinking fast to fight back the sting of tears as her throat got tight.

His fingers traced gently up to unfasten the collar, slipping it from her neck and discarding it on the floor in disgust before tugging the straps of her straitjacket loose. Even that little bit of freedom felt like a weight had been lifted from her chest, and Wanda took a deep breath as Vision eased the rest of the restraints loose and began untangling them.

As soon as her arms were free she flung them around his neck, pressing herself right up against the warm curve of his body.

His arms settled around her a second later, and she let out a shuddering breath as he cradled her close.

"God, Vizh, I've missed you..."

"It is all right. I am here now," he soothed, his fingers trailing gently down her spine in a feather light touch that made her shiver. "I will protect you, Wanda."

Wanda turned her head into the crook of his neck, her eyelashes fluttering across the crimson skin as she settled herself in his lap, letting her eyes slip closed. Vision was solid and warm beneath her, and she let herself melt into his embrace in relief.

Everything that had happened in the past week - Lagos and the Accords and the fight at the airport - it was starting to get to her.

She'd been able to put it out of her mind while she was spending time at the compound with Vision, and after that when she'd been driving nearly cross-country with Clint to pick up Scott. They'd kept her distracted, kept her from falling into that dangerous pit of self-loathing that she so often teetered on the edge of.

It was a lot harder to hide from her thoughts when they were the only thing she had left to occupy her time, however, and the creeping despair was once again trying to take root in her mind. She kept hearing the explosions, the screams. Seeing the news feed of the victims being rescued from the building, neat little bodies on ash-covered stretchers. Lines of the dead along the curb as Steve stood with an arm around her waist to hold her back, to keep her from trying to help. To shield her from the glares of the gathering crowd.

The worst was the memory of that awful silence as she watched War Machine plummet, watched him hit the ground before Tony or Sam could reach him. The sound of her heart pounding in her ears, broken only by the faint static of a com device as Tony choked out "Rhody is down" before going silent once more. The sharp, painful swell of emotions from Vision as he realized that he'd made a mistake; the horror and _guilt_ because his attention hadn't been on his shot, it had been on the girl lying weak in his arms.

Because Wanda had distracted him.

Wanda shuddered a little, biting her tongue sharply to keep from shaking her head as she desperately tried to clear her mind. She didn't dare let thoughts like that linger.

"Are you cold?" Vision asked gently, his hands moving to rub her upper arms like he'd probably seen on television as he felt her shiver.

"A little," she lied.

It wasn't a total lie, as it was certainly cold down there. Even now her skin was starting to prickle into little bumps where she wasn't pressed against the gentle hum of Vision's body, and she tucked herself closer to him.

Vision seemed to study her for a moment, then leaned to unzip the little bag he had brought.

"What's this?" she asked, prodding the bag gently with a foot as Vision drew something dark out.

"I brought your sweater. You always feel the cold, and they don't keep the temperature very high in here, so I figured you might need it," he shrugged, unwrapping the garment.

A little thread of warm affection wove its way up into her chest, and Wanda leaned back as Vision held out the jacket to help her put on.

"How thoughtful," she smiled, allowing him to help her slip her arms into the sleeves. The smell was familiar, so sharply contrasted to the acrid scent of disinfectant that seemed to cling to the prison that Wanda couldn't help but bury her nose in the collar as she rested her hands back on Vision's chest and he adjusted the material across her shoulders.

Once he seemed to be satisfied with the sweater, he drew her back into his hold, a hand stroking gently over her head and down through her hair.

She stared at her hand, splayed across Vision's synthetic heart, as she traced idle patterns onto the front of his sweater vest with her fingertips. She could feel the solid thumping of his pulse beneath her ear, and she closed her eyes to take it in.

Comforting. Familiar.

 _Home_.

Having him here...

Wanda startled a bit as she felt Vision shift beneath her, and glanced up to find him looking down at her with his brows pinched in worry.

"Your heart rate is elevated," he informed her softly.

Wanda bit back the little smile that tried to quirk her lips, tucking her head back against Vision's chest.

"Is it?" she asked, tracing a finger along the edge of his collar. Her chipped black nail polish made a sharp contrast with the pressed white material, and she ran her touch back in the other direction as she felt him nod.

"Yes. By nearly fifteen percent."

She hummed a little note of acknowledgement, hiding her smile against his shoulder.

"Remember, the visit is ten minutes," the guard snapped suddenly from the corridor, making her jump. "And you've got three left."

Wanda couldn't help her little flinch into Vision's side, and felt his hand ghost up between her shoulder blades in response.

"I am aware, thank you," he replied in the clipped manner he often used to show irritation.

If the guard was put off by the tone he didn't show it, turning his back on them with a shrug. "And you'd better get those restraints back on her before you leave."

It was Vision's turn to flinch, his impossibly blue eyes flooding with guilt, and Wanda reached up to caress his cheek worriedly.

"Vizh?"

"Wanda, I-..."

He turned a devastated look on her, and Wanda felt her heart ache for him. Clearly her poor synthetic friend hadn't thought about that part of his plan - the part where he would have to be the one to tie her back into her restraints, to put the damned collar back around her throat.

He looked between her and the guard in distress, his eyes shifting and rotating with unease as he fought an internal debate.

For the briefest moment, Wanda considered running; making a break for it. But she didn't know where she'd go. The entire place was crawling with guards, and every new room seemed to be separated by a set of heavy-duty locked doors. Even if she could find the strength to tear her way free, she would still have to find a way out of the prison, and if anything she'd overheard was true, they were in the middle of the ocean.

Yes, Vision never seemed to tire and could probably carry her back to shore, but what then?

They'd be fugitives, on the run with nowhere to go and the whole world looking for them. She could vanish, she was pretty sure. Long dark hair wasn't exactly a distinguishable characteristic unless she was using her magic. But Vision...there was nothing he could do to hide. No way to disguise himself that would prevent recognition. And she wasn't about to let him take the fall for helping her escape.

"Vish," she murmured, tracing her fingers down his arm to catch his hand in hers. She swallowed hard, closing her eyes. "You have to."

"I can't..." he said softly, his voice tight. "I can't do that to you..."

Wanda glanced up at him, the pain in his expression chilling her. The thought of locking her up again was tearing at him, she could feel the distress radiating from him in waves, and she let out a little breath.

It was something else she knew he'd never forgive himself for - putting her back into the hands of the people who sought to hold her prisoner and torment her. And she couldn't do that to him.

With trembling hands, Wanda leaned to grab the collar, fitting it around her own neck and pulling the straps tight as Vision watched, his eyes swimming with agony.

"I'm sorry," he whispered again.

"We both knew it was only temporary," she said, trying to play it off, but the little catch in her voice was painfully telling.

The collar was heavy and cold around her throat.

She slipped her arms back into the straitjacket as Vision locked the collar around her throat, taking slow, measured breaths to force her body into a state of calm.

"I _will_ come back and see you," Vision promised, tying her into the straitjacket once more, although far more loosely than before. "And in the meantime I _will_ find a way to have you released."

"I trust you," she whispered.

"Time's up. Lock her up and get out," the guard spat.

Hesitantly, Vision replaced the locks on her restraints, pausing to trace the back of a finger over her pale cheek. Their eyes met, and his shifted for a second before focusing in on her intently, as if memorizing her face.

"Don't give up," he whispered.

With that he stood, grabbing his bag and backing out of the cell as the guard sealed her in once more. He gave her one last tiny, pained smile before following the uniformed man back into the facility, and Wanda felt her bottom lip tremble.

"I won't," she promised, watching him leave as her blink sent twin tears racing over her cheeks. "Vizh..."

* * *

"I wish to request her release."

The look the warden gave Vision was absolutely acidic.

"You can take that up with Senator Ross, but I guaran-damn-tee you the answer's gonna be no."

With that the warden turned around, sorting the key to Wanda's restraints back into a lock-box in his filing cabinet as he muttered to himself. Vision glared at the back of the man's head, trying to sort through the sudden irritation that seemed to try and take over his processors whenever any of the guards denied him a request.

"She is clearly displaying signs of distress."

"Look, if she didn't want to be in prison she shouldn't have broken the law," the man replied, dropping back into his chair and giving Vision an exasperated look. "We're not psychologists. We're just here to make sure they don't escape."

Vision opened his mouth to deliver a biting reply, thought better of it, and instead took a slow breath before starting again.

"At the very least, I would request she be moved back up with the others."

"I'm sorry, pal, but our camera for that cell is out, and-"

"As soon as it is fixed, then. Place her back with the others. It is detrimental to her mental state to be alone," Vision said, adjusting his tone to reflect an authority that he likely did not have in a place like this. The man seemed to buy it, however, and bowed his head over some paperwork with a mumbled "I'll see what I can do."

Vision hesitated for another long minute in the doorway, wishing there was some way he could help Wanda, before hefting a sigh and turning to leave.

He had another call to place to Secretary Ross.


	7. Chapter 7

Something had gone wrong with her powers.

That was the only thing that Wanda could figure as she shook her head, trying to sort through the _noise_ and the _clutter_ that pounded against the inside of her skull as if trying to break out.

She'd tried reaching out with her magic after Vision left, trying to connect mentally to the others. As long as she kept her head down, the guards could not see the glow of her eyes, and she was safe. At least, so she'd thought. And so she had reached out, grasping for her teammates.

She had just begun to brush the edges of some thoughts that she believed may have been Scott when the guards had activated the collar, sending electricity coursing sharply through her and sending her magic haywire.

She'd connected to them all then, but only for a second - thousands of thoughts and words and images flooding her head for a moment, blinding and deafening her with the color and sound of it all before she'd slipped into a blessed blackness for a long while.

When she next woke it had all still been in her head, the endless memories and fears of her teammates pounding like a hangover against the backs of her eyes.

She hadn't dared use her powers after that.

That didn't seem to make a difference to the pulsing red within her, though. It ebbed through her veins, dancing along her thoughts and parading images from her own memory and others', blending them into a chaotic decoupage of scenes that wouldn't go away.

The longer that the memories were all allowed to blend together, the harder it was getting for her to sort them out. Every new scene that surfaced only served to confuse her further and pound against her throbbing head.

The surroundings weren't helping either, because this felt exactly like Hydra, but this time instead of being the prized weapon, she was the war criminal awaiting torture. And if her agony _then_ had been as a friend, she couldn't even begin to imagine what was in store for an enemy. Medical experiments were one thing - torture was another.

The needles had always been the worst, of course, because they set fire to her veins like acid burning in her blood stream, and left her screaming until her voice stopped working and she didn't have any energy left to react to the _hurt_.

Wanda knew they would be coming back soon, with more needles and more test tubes with that awful glowing fluid to pump her full of it, warping her body and muttering those seven damn words over and over, overtop of her screams. Programming her into a soldier for them to-

Wanda shook her head, ignoring the little warning beep of her collar. That was Bucky's memory, not hers. At least, not entirely. HYDRA was hers as well, but the programming wasn't.

Determinedly, Wanda swept that memory out of her head, clawing her way back out of the chaos.

She needed to focus.

She forced a few deep breaths when she realized that she was starting to panic. Hyperventilating would do her no good. She needed to calm down and think. The instructors had told her to stay focused. That was half of the battle, after all - the control of her own mind. Unsteady breath meant wavering hands, which meant missed shots.

And missed shots meant failing.

She couldn't afford to fail this late in the training. If she didn't pass this test, she'd be dead like the other girls that the Red Room had culled out of the ranks for-

Wanda shook her head again, her teeth grit.

That wasn't her memory, that was a lingering trace of Natasha's. She wasn't in the Red Room. She was at the Raft.

Wanda smothered back the memory of a dark ballet room in a building that smelled like sterilized death, forcing herself to look around as she felt the memories surge up again.

One slipped past before she could stop it, and Wanda felt her stomach drop out as she suddenly found herself plummeting toward the ground, reaching for a limp hand that she would never catch as the ground got closer, closer, _closer_ -

Wanda shuddered, using her feet to push herself further back into the corner of her cell as a little whine escaped her lips.

Sam. That was Sam's memory. She wasn't in the air.

She was at the Raft, in a little viewing box, like a bug.

Wanda swallowed as she felt cold fear winding up her spine.

It was another tiny glass-walled cell in the middle of nowhere, heavy restraints holding her down, but this time Pietro was not with her to protect her. He was dead, and the doctor would be back soon with the staff for another agonizing dose of its power to make her head throb like it was splitting in two, and she could see the blue light reflecting off of the hallway out of the corner of her eye, the staff's glow morphing into the shining arc reactor of a suit, the Stark logo emblazoned on the front as it came to kill her just like the bomb that-

NO.

Wanda banged the back of her head against the wall behind her to clear it, breathing hard as she curled into herself once more.

"Hey, what was that? You okay, Wanda?"

She recognized the voice, but it did little to soothe her as she pressed her forehead to her knees with a soft whimper.

The guards had dumped her back in her original cell again almost an hour ago, and she was still aching from the hit of electricity they'd used to subdue her for the trip. The others had tried talking to her, mostly aimless chatter and asking if she was okay, but she couldn't seem to hold the conversation for more than a few minutes. Their voices triggered up the memories.

She wanted out of here. The walls felt too small, like they were closing in, and the air felt thick and heavy. She felt like she was suffocating, the tightly-laced straitjacket that put a constant pressure on her ribcage not helping the matter. Everything inside her was screaming to get out, and everything around her was pressing in. She couldn't move. Her cell was getting more claustrophobic by the minute, and she scrambled further back into the corner as her vision grayed a little around the edges.

She was breathing too hard, making herself dizzy, but she couldn't clear the image of a dingy little stone prison from her sight - the image mixing with the water-filled cabin of some jet, the bright lights of a tiny sterile room full of sharp medical supplies and emotionless doctors, the endless nothingness of sub-atomic space - and she didn't want to be trapped there, she couldn't be alone in that place without Pietro-

"Hey, answer me, are you okay? Wanda?"

A familiar voice. Not Pietro. Clint. Worried.

"It's not Hydra, it's not Hydra, _it's not Hydra_..." she hissed, scrunching her eyes shut as she rocked herself back and forth slightly. A warning beep from her collar stilled her actions in a heartbeat, and Wanda bit her tongue to keep her composure as terrified tears welled in her eyes. She was Wanda. She was at The Raft. The other memories of people and places and _pain_ were not hers. She was all alone.

"Come on kid, don't panic. Can you hear me? Just breathe, all right? You're not with Hydra, you're safe."

"Well, I wouldn't use the word 'safe' exactly..."

"Scott? Not helping."

"Sorry."

"Wanda?"

Wanda pressed her forehead into her kneecaps hard enough to hurt and gritted her teeth as she tried to drive the haunting thoughts from her mind.

She had to keep telling herself that she was imagining the smoke, the dust, the sickly-sweet smell of rotting death that was consuming her parent's bodies barely five feet from her and her brother as the two of them held onto each other and stared at their doom, hardly daring to move.

It would figure that out of all of the pasts she'd just had in her head from the other Avengers, her own past was the one that would come to haunt her the worst.

"Wanda, talk to me. What's the matter?"

What _wasn't_ the matter? Her head was full of her teammates' worst nightmares, and she had no way to release the built-up clutter of burning red inside her. Her hands were trapped. She was locked up like a rabid dog, in a facility where everyone seemed to be waiting for her to step out of line so they could hurt her, and she had _willingly walked into this and allowed them to chain her_ because she believed that it was the right thing to do. Because she was the one who had started this mess, and she'd wanted to make amends. And now she was trapped, most likely forgotten, and all alone. Again.

And the others were here because she'd messed up on that mission in Lagos. Because she'd killed all those innocent people. That little girl...

Wanda couldn't choke back her sob, and she buried her face harder against her knees as her chest tightened to the point of agony and her head filled with death, _so_ much death. She could see every one of them - bullet holes in innocent people, assassinations taking place through a haze of blue, giant green hands tearing buildings apart, sighting down a rifle, lighting the fuse to a bomb, throwing a disk and watching someone contort in agony - it was all playing out.

She'd done this to herself - she'd dug through their memories while working with Ultron, and now she was a victim of them all.

Her next breath was a sharp sob.

She'd destroyed the Avengers, too. Everything had been fine until she'd messed it all up. She was the reason that the Accords had been made, after all, the document that had split them down the middle. They'd even gone so far as to name it for her. It was because of her that the UN conference was called and subsequently bombed, killing more innocents and depriving T'Challa of his father. She was the reason that psychopath Zemo had lured Bucky out and gotten information from him, and was now going to try to destroy the world with it.

Once again, she had sentenced the planet to destruction with her idiocy and weakness.

What was it that Ultron had told her all those months ago? She would tear the Avengers apart from the inside?

She let out a shuddering breath, her nails digging into her sides through the layers of heavy fabric that held her bound. He had been right. If it hadn't been for her, none of this would have ever happened...

"Wanda. Talk to me."

Clint's voice was a sharp demand, and it was only the habit of following Steve's commands at practice that drew her head up and tore the words from her constricted throat.

"It's my fault, it's all my fault," she sobbed, hating herself, feeling wretched and pathetic as every doubt and insecurity came rushing back. "Sokovia, and the buildings dropping and killing so many people, the bomb, the assassination, the carrier crashing, it's my fault, I killed all of them-"

"Hang on, calm down, you're not making any sense-" Clint called, but she shook her head.

"I let him do it. I knew he was a maniac that wanted to destroy the world and I was weak and didn't stop him when I had the chance. If I had, all of those people in Sokovia would still be alive. My _brother_ would still be alive. And none of you would be fighting if it weren't for all those people I killed with that bomb. He told me I would tear you all apart from the inside and he was right, all I've done is hurt you all-"

"Wanda, listen to me, that's not-"

But now she had started and she couldn't seem to stop, her stomach feeling split open while the guilt spilled from her like blood.

"I believed them. I believed them when they said they were going to help, and I brought Pietro with me, I told him it was our only chance. I trusted Hydra and I got my brother killed for it. And now look at me... What I've become..."

She gasped in a breath, unsure if it was the straitjacket or her emotions that were crushing the air from her chest.

"They were right. I am a time bomb, just waiting to go off and wipe out everything around me. Everything I touch gets destroyed. I'm nothing but a monster," she sobbed, burying her face against her knees once more as her collar gave another warning beep.

After all, who other than a monster could do the horrible things that she was responsible for and still try to call themself a hero? Pretend that they were trying to amend for a sin so enormous that it could never be blotted out, not even by all the good deeds in the world?

"Okay, hold up, who the _hell_ told you that?" Barton demanded, a dark fury in his tone. Wanda shook her head, her chest aching at the thought that he would _still_ defend her, knowing what she was, what she was responsible for.

It was guilt, it must have been guilt - Pietro had died to save him, so he felt like he owed her. It was the only reason he was still here, the only reason he hadn't left her alone.

Everyone knew that she was a disaster waiting to happen, all they had to do was look at her. Every time she tried to help she wound up killing people.

The iron bars around her crackled with red energy, and a sharp jolt of warning from her collar served only to push her further into her panic. Red sparks flashed briefly in the air and she gasped in a shuddering breath in fright. Everything in her head surged up, screaming to get out.

"Wanda, hang on, listen to me, you have to calm down," Barton said, but he sounded scared too.

They were all afraid of her. Even the people that trusted her the most were afraid of her.

Only Pietro had never feared her, and he was dead. She wasn't there to protect her brother when he needed her most, and now she was alone. She would never see him again.

And it was all her fault.

The creak of iron made her shudder, curling tighter into herself.

"Wanda!"

She was going to do it again. She was going to lose control and everything was going to blow up in her face, and then she'd have a whole new list of names to add to her murder count.

And she'd be stranded on a heap of metal in the middle of the ocean, surrounded by the bodies of her friends, with no one left who cared enough to rescue her as she waited to die. It would have been better if Vision had never pulled her from the train in Sokovia...

The shouts of the guards barely registered to her as they approached, yelling at one another as they motioned toward her. The only distinct phrase she caught was one of them ordering "knock her out."

Wanda looked up as she heard the bars of her cell open, her body tensing as she tried desperately to reign in her powers and brace herself for the inevitable pain from her collar. A guard stepped inside, holding what looked like a gun, and aimed it at her.

A low-power shock at her throat was enough to keep her from lashing out at him out of pure instinct. A second later the guard pulled the trigger, and something sharp jabbed her thigh.

She yelped in surprise, trying to scramble back while simultaneously twisting to see what had hit her, and she got a blurry glimpse of a dart sticking from her leg before her senses whirled to the side and she was falling into blackness.


	8. Chapter 8

Wanda blinked up at the ceiling of her holding cell, her brain feeling light and fuzzy.

She let her head loll to the side, following her gaze as she traced it across the ceiling and over to the front of her prison, trying to figure out what had happened. Her mouth felt dry, her throat aching like it had been rubbed down with sandpaper when she tried to swallow, and her vision was blurring at the edges. Her mind felt pleasantly floaty, however, almost like being tipsy.

She was lying on the little cot in her cell, her feet propped up as if she had passed out, and a damp cloth across her forehead.

With a little moan and a lot more effort than the move should have required, Wanda drew her legs up against her chest and rolled over on her side, letting the cloth slide from her head. She stared at the wall for a long moment, trying to piece together what had happened.

She could remember the guards rushing into her cell, the others' memories whirling through her thoughts like poison, someone screaming her name-

Clint.

Clint had been calling her. He had been worried.

Her first attempt at speaking sent her into a little coughing fit, her throat dry and sore, and she took a few seconds to swallow before trying again.

"Clint?" she called, her voice weak.

"Hey kid," the immediate reply from the next cell over was both forcibly chipper and immensely relieved. "Good to hear from you. How you feeling?"

"Did I get drugged...?" she asked, waiting for a long few seconds before the man replied.

"...Yeah. You were panicking, so they hit you up with something to calm you down a bit. Is it working?"

Wanda concentrated for a second, hesitantly grasping for the lingering threads of her tortured nightmares. The thoughts were all her own, thankfully, and muted down into soft whispers of the horrors that had plagued her before, so perhaps the drugs were working. She certainly felt sleepy.

"I...think so?"

"Well, that's something, I suppose. What happened?"

"My stupid powers got out of control," she muttered in disgust. " _Again._ "

Clint didn't reply for a second, and she heard a shift of movement from his cell a second before he let out a breath.

"Hey, can you come over to this wall? I want to talk to you for a minute."

She nodded for a second before remembering that he could not see her.

"Yeah."

Sitting up set her senses swirling around her at a dizzying rate, and Wanda swayed for a long moment as she waited for them to settle back into place.

She made her way haltingly over to the wall she shared with Clint, leaning back against it and allowing her weight to slide her to the ground.

"I'm here," she murmured, letting her head fall back against the cool metal as she stared up at the lights.

From the other cell she heard him take a slow breath, then blow it out again.

"Look, I know I'm not the best at this, and it's probably not going to mean much coming from me, but... Look, it's not your fault."

"Clint-"

"No, no, hear me out. With Ultron-"

There was a second of silence, then another heavy sigh from him as he tried to decide where to start.

"Did I ever tell you about Loki?"

"No," she murmured, letting her eyes slip closed and watching the bright image of the fluorescent lights on the inside of her eyelids. It was a name she'd heard a few times, but everyone had seemed a bit reluctant to discuss the topic when it came up, so she hadn't pressed.

She heard the shift of movement as Clint settled himself against the other side of the wall.

"I got controlled by someone we were fighting," he started hesitantly. "Guy named Loki. He brainwashed me, had me attack my friends, and I killed a lot of innocent people. Even though I knew it wasn't me doing those things, it was still my hands that drew the bow, and I felt guilty for months afterwards."

Wanda shook her head, biting her bottom lip. If he was trying to draw parallels, it wasn't the best one he could have chosen.

"I was not being controlled by Ultron," she pointed out weakly.

"No, but you weren't _in_ control there either," he corrected. " You could barely hold back your powers, and you had no idea what kind of game you'd gotten yourself stuck in until it was too late. And you definitely got played by HYDRA before that. You were, what, fifteen? When they got a hold of you? Fed you all those lies about 'making you powerful' to 'help you save your country?' Right before stuffing you and however many other people into their lab and trying to kill you all by dosing you with the power from Loki's staff? Trust me, kid, you were _not_ in control of that situation."

"I still did as they said. I still attacked you all, of my free will, and got many innocent people hurt in the process."

"Yeah, you did. But the thing is, you weren't trying to hurt anyone. You thought you were protecting your home and the people there by going after us. And you stopped as soon as you realized that you were wrong. All of the things you blame yourself for, none of it was malicious. You were trying to do the right thing, but operating on bad information, and going about it in a bad way because you didn't know better."

"It was our choice to sign up with Strucker."

"You and your brother were a pair of grief-stricken kids who latched onto the first adult that promised to make it all go away," he said. "You made the choice, yeah, but you didn't know any better. You _couldn't_ have known any better, and they made damn sure of that. You got played."

"But with Ultron-"

"Neither of you had any idea what Ultron was capable of either. None of us did, until it was far too late and we were stuck on damage control. The important part is that once you realized what he was planning, you worked with us to save everyone you could. You cleared out an entire city full of innocents before the psycho-robot attacked, and probably saved thousands of lives. So don't even start blaming yourself for that." Clint paused for a moment, and when he next spoke she could hear the wry twist in his voice. "Besides, it was Tony's stupid-ass machine in the first place, so if anyone's at fault it's him."

"The bomb-" she started pathetically, because this one was undoubtedly on her hands - the eleven deaths at Lagos would not have happened had it not been for her - but Barton cut her off again.

"Was an accident. Did you mean to hurt anyone in that building?"

"No, but-"

"You were trying to save the people on the street, so you tossed it up in the air, right?"

She nodded, even though he couldn't see her.

"Normally that would have been a good move, but the buildings were all too close, and way too tall, and you ran out of time - you couldn't contain it any longer."

She swallowed hard, looking down at her feet. When Clint spoke again, his voice was soft.

"I saw the footage, Wanda. There was nowhere you could have thrown that bomb that wouldn't have resulted in deaths. If you'd let it explode on ground level, it would have just taken out the entire crowd in the marketplace, as well as the foundation of most of those buildings. Those people dying was unavoidable, and it was an accident. It was not your fault. You're new to all of this, and we've all made mistakes before. Yes, it's awful that people die, but you can't just give up and hate yourself for it. You have to work to be better, so it doesn't happen again, but you've got to keep fighting. If you hadn't been there, Steve and a bunch of other innocent people in that square wouldn't have made it home to their families."

He paused for a moment, and she heard him let out a sharp breath, but when he next spoke she could hear the affectionate little smile in his voice. "We need you, kid. And I don't want you beating yourself up over things you couldn't control. Lord knows I've done enough of that to know. Accidents happen, and it's not always your fault, Wanda. Okay?"

"Okay," she replied hesitantly, shuffling her feet because she couldn't fiddle with her hands in the straitjacket and her nervous tick was acting up. She wasn't entirely sure if she'd just been praised or scolded.

"Good. Oh, and one more thing," Clint said, fabric rustling as he stood. "Whoever told you that you were a monster? They're a damn idiot."

His comment was so unexpected that it startled a small smile from her, and Wanda leaned her head back against the wall as she felt the world sway a little bit around her.

"You are not a monster, Wanda Maximoff," Clint assured her gently. "And you can take my word on that, because I have _seen_ monsters, in every shape and form. You have ridiculously powerful abilities, and are doing your best to help save people where you can. There is nothing monstrous about that. You are a good person. Never forget that."

"Thank you," she whispered, feeling herself tear up.

"Only telling the truth, kid," he said, his voice hitching a little as he shrugged. "Also, when we finally get out of here? You're getting a hug, whether you want it or not."

Wanda laughed, the sound small and choked by her tears, but genuine.

"Believe me, I will want it."

"Good. Hang in there, kid. This isn't over yet," he promised. "We'll get you out of here, and then we'll all go for a drink, because we are _definitely_ going to need it after this shit show."


	9. Chapter 9

Clint looked up sharply as the cell bay door opened, revealing one Thaddeus Ross, standing with his arms crossed and backed by three men in lab coats and a guard who waited at the door.

The archer scrambled to his feet with as much speed as he could while still having the movement look casual, hovering at the front of his cell.

In the adjoining prison, Wanda was starting to stir, her fitful sleep interrupted by even the small sounds of approaching footsteps as Ross crossed to the glass that sealed her off. Clint could feel nerves prickling along his skin as he watched the group gather outside Wanda's cell, peering in.

"Is this the one?"

"Yes," Ross answered, his foot tapping almost impatiently.

"Looks fairly normal, I'll admit. No physical sign of the mutation?"

"Her eyes will glow, but that's about it, as far as her records list."

"So it's all mental, then."

"She does seem to use her hands to direct it."

Two of the men in lab coats scribbled down notes as the third peered more closely into Wanda's cell, making the girl edge backwards nervously.

Ross merely observed from a couple steps behind them.

After a few more seconds of staring and muttering quietly to themselves, the men in lab coats turned back to Ross.

"We'll need a much closer examination, of course, but this is good for starters. We can set up for some basic scans and prep work."

"The guard will direct you to your lab space. I want diagnostics as soon as your team is set up," Ross ordered as they moved toward the door. "Physical, psychological, neural scans, blood work, everything. I want to know what kind of enhancements we're dealing with here." Ross turned his attention back to the cell, raising an eyebrow at Wanda when he noticed her horrified, wide-eyed stare. "And if the enhancements can be turned off, or cut out of her."

"If you fucking touch her, I swear-" Clint growled before he could stop himself, anger burning hot in his chest as he pounded a fist against the glass.

Ross turned to him with a cool glare, and Clint returned it in kind.

The Secretary of State narrowed his eyes, a slow, saccharine grin creeping across his face.

"May I remind you, Mr. Barton, that the fates of you and your companions have been left entirely at my discretion," the man purred. "If I wish to chloroform the little monster and dissect her, I doubt that the UN would see fit to so much as issue a reprimand."

Wanda made a little choking sound, and out of his peripherals Clint saw her pressing herself back into the far corner of her cell in terror.

"If you do anything to her, it won't be the UN that you'll have to worry about," he snarled. "You haven't seen Captain America get mad yet, but I guarantee you it ain't pretty. So unless you want your internal organs rearranged, I suggest you keep your filthy hands off of her."

"It's endearing that you would defend her," Ross said with a false grin. "I assure you, I'm quite touched. But your Captain is not here, nor is he planning to be. You and your companions are harmless without your fancy gear, and I've got you all locked in cells. There is nothing that any of you could possibly threaten me with. It is quite adorable that you would try, though."

"I'm warning you, Ross, leave her be," Clint bit out, trying to sound threatening even as his heart ached with despair. Ross was right - he was helpless. There was nothing he could do to the man, and they all knew it.

"I'll be back for her tomorrow," Ross said in reply, giving him a careless shrug. "We'll see if we can figure out which part of her brain gives her those powers, and then look into removing it."

Without another word he turned and began to walk away.

Wanda's quiet sob of fright from the cell beside him had Clint's heartbeat pounding in his ears in rage.

"I thought you had a daughter," Clint shouted at the man's back, feeling a sick little thrill of joy when Ross tensed up, freezing mid-step. "You really telling me that you'd be okay with cutting up someone's little girl? That you'd be able to justify hurting her like that, enough to let yourself sleep at night?"

Ross faltered for a long moment, and Clint let a grim smile cross his face, knowing he'd struck a nerve.

"It's not like we're torturing her," Ross said more quietly, angling his head back but not turning around. "She's going to be properly sedated, and receive medical care afterwards until she stabilizes. We're just finding a way to control her powers."

"By cutting part of her brain out," Clint spat. The man turned, pacing a few steps back toward him with his mask of indifference back in place.

"You make me sound like some kind of monster. I assure you, the only monster we're dealing with here is the one in the cell beside yours."

Clint couldn't think through his anger quickly enough to form a reply before the man was talking again.

"Besides, wouldn't it be better for everyone if we could simply...remove her powers?" Ross asked.

"Not if you're willing to lobotomize her to do it," Clint spat. The man gave him a shrug.

"Unfortunately, Mister Barton, that decision is not yours to make. The UN wants her neutralized, through whatever methods necessary. Just be grateful that I didn't allow them to solve that problem by putting a bullet in her head."

Clint was quiet as he watched the man walk away once again, feeling cold.

The UN wanted her dealt with. Permanently. No forgiveness, no second chance. They were gonna take his baby and cut up her brain to make sure she couldn't use her powers.

Not for the first time, he prayed that Steve would be able to find them quickly.

Clint waited until the cell bay doors had hissed closed once more before turning his attention to the cell beside his.

"Wanda?" he asked quietly. "Sweetheart, are you okay?"

"This is my punishment, isn't it?" she whispered, still curled in a trembling ball in the corner. "For all of the wicked things I've done? For all the death I've wrought?"

"Okay, no. Stop that right now, you hear me?" Clint cut her off, his throat feeling tight with frustration at his helplessness. "You have done _nothing_ to deserve this, Wanda. _Nothing."_

"Don't blame yourself cause those people are assholes with no concept of human rights," Sam agreed. "They didn't have the right to lock any of us in here without a trial, much less issue any procedures be done on you because of your enhancements. Everything they are doing is wrong, and you deserve _none_ of it."

"You heard what they said, though...he's coming back for me tomorrow..." she sniffled, scrubbing her cheek against her shoulder to get the tears off. "Th-they're gonna-"

"They're not gonna touch you. I promise," Clint said, his voice rough.

"Don't," Wanda whispered, her voice wavering. "You cannot keep that promise and you know it. You can do nothing to protect me while locked in you cell."

"Maybe not physically, but that doesn't mean I'm not damn well gonna try."

"What could you possibly do? What could any of you possibly do to stop him?" Wanda asked, and Clint flinched at the despair in her voice.

"We try to get help from whoever will give it. Delay things as long as we can. Give Steve time to get his ass in gear and get us out. Ross hates enhanced, but he's still human," Clint reassured her. "He was a good man at one point, and we can play to his pity if nothing else."

"Clint..." Sam said hesitantly, but the archer shook his head.

"He knows this is wrong; he knows this isn't procedure. That's why he hesitated. That's why he didn't let them execute her right off the bat. We'll figure something out, I promise you."

"Lights out," a guard called, a moment before the cells were plunged into near complete darkness for the evening. Clint moved so that he was sitting against the wall that separated him from the little witch, dropping his voice to a murmur.

"We'll figure this out, Wanda, I promise," he whispered. "No one is gonna cut you up on my watch."

She hummed an appreciative little sound in reply, but Clint couldn't help but feel wretched as he listened her cry herself to sleep over the next ten minutes or so.

"C'mon, Steve," he muttered to himself, staring up at the ceiling and swallowing hard. "Where the hell are you?"


	10. Chapter 10

Vision sat at the kitchen counter, his fingers steepled on the cool granite before him as his foot tapped out a steady beat on the stool the way he'd seen Sam do when the man was deep in thought.

He'd tried everything.

Everyone, from the prison warden to the secretary of state to the UN council members themselves, had all refused his request to have Wanda released from the Raft. He'd even offered alternatives, such as keeping her under a form of house arrest instead, but apparently the knowledge that she had overpowered him had spread, and none of them thought she could be safely contained anywhere but at the underwater prison.

He could see no legal path to freedom for her.

More troubling than that, however, was the fact that there seemed to be no determined end date for her incarceration. From what he'd gleaned from overheard conversations and records books, she was to spend the rest of her life locked up in that straitjacket and shock collar. Never again to see the light of day or have the freedom of movement.

And he simply could not stand for that.

Vision had tried to visit her again as well, but he'd been turned away. Apparently Miss Maximoff had suffered some kind of episode related to her powers while he'd been looking for her key to freedom, and the guards had deemed it no longer safe to allow anyone in to see her.

Even him.

With another long sigh, Vision let his head hang in defeat.

He was helpless. There was nothing that he could do to free her. Wanda hadn't signed the Accords.

He'd signed the Accords, but now his hands were bound: the document forbid him from assisting criminals in any way. And unfortunately, right now, "criminals" included the rogue Avengers.

The document that he'd agreed to abide by in order to protect people was now the cause of his dearest friends being hurt because he could not help them.

Vision stared blankly into the mottled granite, his fingers tapping out a rhythm against the top of his head - another nervous habit he'd picked up from the others.

Wanda couldn't stay at the Raft. There was no question about that, not after he'd seen how they had her locked up. Imprisonment like that would destroy her. Mentally, emotionally, physically, _mercilessly_. He needed to get her out of there. Quickly.

The United Nations were having none of it, however, and so far had blocked him at every turn.

Vision let out a slow breath, trying to push the memory of Wanda's terrified stare out of his thoughts. The memory of her agonized cry as the guards shocked her. That awful, sickening feeling of not being able to do _anything_ to help.

Helplessness was a new feeling for him. It was settling somewhere between sadness, frustration, and rage, and it was boiling in his stomach like a pot left too long on the stove, waiting to bubble up and overflow but never quite able to escape the lid he had clamped onto it.

He didn't like this feeling at all.

Vision pushed himself upright once more, determination flooding back into him. He _needed_ to get Wanda out of there.

The only problem was that no one would allow him to take her.

He tapped his fingers on the countertop, his mind whirling through useless options until it slowly settled on what looked like the only viable course of action.

If the UN were preventing him from obtaining her release, then his only option was...

Vision got to his feet sharply, moving toward the computer as his mind summoned together passwords and floor plans and schedules from what he'd seen in his time at the prison.

A tap of the mouse was enough to wake the machine, and Vision quickly thought back through the glimpses he'd seen of Tony typing the password in, calculating what the characters were. With a few quick taps of the keyboard, he'd unlocked it.

"FRIDAY," he called as the desktop loaded.

"Yes, Sir?"

"Please make sure this computer is untraceable."

"Right away, Sir."

Vision allowed himself a bitter smile as he watched FRIDAY bury the computer's IP in pre-set security.

Even Mr. Stark strayed from the law from time to time, it would seem.

In a few seconds everything was in place, and Vision took a slow breath before starting to type.

Being synthetic gave Vision a connection to technology and its workings that many of the others lacked, and he used those connections now as he dug for information on restricted sites.

He moved quickly, burning his way through firewalls and lockouts, re-routing and subverting and worming his way in and out of the coding with precision, digging for the diagrams and schedules he needed. Once he had it all, he compiled it and sent it to an unlisted email address with a code sequence to bypass the security.

That done, Vision sat back in his chair and folded his hands behind his head as Tony had a habit of doing when he was satisfied with his work.

"FRIDAY, clear history please."

"Done, Sir."

There wasn't a legal way to get Wanda out of the Raft, not for someone who had signed the Accords and had sworn to abide by them. But there were other options.

Perhaps, Vision thought with a little smile, if there was not a legal path to her freedom, he would simply have to resort to an illegal one.


	11. Chapter 11

Wanda woke to the sound of her cell mates arguing.

"This isn't going to work," Sam hissed. "You're counting on a very specific reaction from an unpredictable man-"

"Not like we have a better shot," Clint replied, voice also muted to a sharp whisper as he cut Sam off. "Right now it's her best chance."

"He might be right," Scott added more quietly. "You're not a father, Sam, so you don't know, but I would die to protect my little girl. Whenever I see another little girl upset or in trouble I get this really bad urge to go help, even if I've never seen her before, because she reminds me of my own daughter, and I hate even the thought of her being in pain."

"Yeah, but Wanda's not exactly five. What's to say that he'll make the association? You're also counting on him actually looking past the fact that she's enhanced."

"All we need is a couple seconds of him seeing her as something other than some kind of lab experiment gone wrong-"

"There's got to be someone else that she'd have a better shot of getting help from," Sam muttered.

"Yeah, and who's gonna swing by before Ross waltzes through those doors this morning to come get her, hm?"

"The morning guard's already been by twice."

"And you know how well the conversation with him went," Clint spat, his voice bordering on actual volume. "Ross is her best shot."

"He does have an awful lot of say about what goes on around here..." Scott muttered.

"Clint...?" Wanda asked quietly, that awful, sickening worry starting up in her stomach again.

There was silence for a long second, then she heard Clint shift.

"Hey kid. Sorry, didn't mean to wake you."

"They're coming for me, aren't they?" she asked.

There was a long moment of silence from the other three, and then Clint let out a slow breath.

"Yeah. Yeah, they are."

Wanda took a shuddering breath, trying to calm her nerves as her stomach twisted sickeningly.

"Clint...?"

"Yeah, kiddo?"

"...I'm scared," she admitted, her voice a whimper and tears welling up in her eyes.

"I know, baby, I know," the man soothed desperately. "We'll figure this out, I promise. We're not going to let them do anything to you, just try to stay calm."

Wanda forced a deep breath, hating that she could only fill her lungs so far before the straitjacket restricted her inhale. She let her breath out in a trembling huff, and her next inhale was sharp and fast despite her attempts at calm breathing. Her body wanted to sob in fear.

"It's okay, Wanda," Clint murmured, his voice low and even. "Just focus on me, okay? No use getting yourself all worked up right now, yeah? Just focus on me, and take deep, slow breaths. You're okay."

Wanda did as he told her, focusing her mind determinedly on Clint's voice and not whatever awaited her when the guards came back.

"We'll find a way to get you out of here," Sam promised her gently.

"Yeah," Scott added with a bright enthusiasm that was only a little forced. "You've just got to hang on till Captain America comes back for us. He's not gonna ditch his team."

This statement was met with an uneasy silence that wound Wanda's nerves like a spring.

"Right...?" Scott prompted again, uncertainty in his voice.

Clint let out a soft breath, and Wanda heard a shift of movement.

"He wouldn't leave us, but there's...there's no guarantee that he knows where we are," Sam admitted softly.

Wanda flinched, feeling that white-hot panic beginning to bubble up in her head again.

"Steve's not coming for us...is he?" she asked, wanting to cry.

"He is. I promise you, he is. He's just taking his sweet-ass time about it. You know how he likes to wait till the last possible second to make an entrance," Clint soothed.

"Yeah," Sam chipped in. "He moves slow. You just have to give him some time. Dude's ninety, after all."

"WHAT?!"

Scott's yelp was enough to choke a tiny, surprised laugh out of Wanda's tight throat.

"He _is_ coming for us, Wanda. I promise. You're gonna get out of here," Clint murmured. "It just...might be a while."

She didn't bother telling him that she might not _have_ a while. He knew well enough that they were operating on borrowed time at best.

Wanda leaned back against the wall, staring up at the ceiling in misery as the boys lapsed into a long silence once more.

Her fingertips felt numb, and she focused on long, slow breaths to keep herself from panicking as she tried to wiggle them around.

The waiting was killing her, and a tiny, stupid part of her brain wished the guards would just hurry up and come take her, because then at least she wouldn't be left in this suffocating suspense any longer.

"How much time you think we have?" Scott asked gently, echoing Wanda's thoughts before she could voice them.

As if on cue, there was the sharp tramp of boots from the hall, and Wanda felt her breath catch in her throat.

No, on second thought, she took it back. They could take as long as they pleased to come get her because this feeling was _worse_ than waiting.

The feeling before had been nerves, but this one was pure _terror_.

"Okay, stay calm, kiddo," Clint muttered quickly, and she heard him shift closer to her cell as the footsteps got louder.

"Clint," she whimpered. "What do I do?"

"Ross may hate enhanced, but he can be reasoned with," Clint hissed. "You look a bit like his daughter. Appeal to the father in him."

"How do I do that?"

"Show him you're not some monster. Let him see how scared you are. Tell him you're afraid, and beg him not to do this to you. Play him as hard as you have to in order to get his sympathy, do you understand me?"

She nodded a little, trembling.

"This is gonna be your only shot, Wanda. Don't let your pride get you killed. If you have to cry like a scared little girl, then do it. You are _not_ above begging right now, is that clear?"

"Yes," she breathed as the doors to their cell block slid open.

Three pairs of uniformed men walked in, followed by Ross and a fourth pair of guards, and Wanda swallowed hard as she heard Clint move away from the wall they shared.

"...and have them run laps or something. I don't need them riling her up while we try to move her," Ross was saying to one of the guards. He stopped in the middle of the room, two guards moving to each of their cells as he looked around.

"Good morning, gentlemen," he called to her teammates. "Let's try not to make this too much of a production, now, shall we?"

Wanda could only watch in horror as the door to Scott's cell slid open. She staggered to her feet as the guards entered, ignoring the man's protests as they hauled him out by either arm and marched him away. Sam was next, and she felt her trembling knees give out beneath her, landing her in a heap on the cold floor as Clint shouted a string of obscenities.

She could only watch in horror as Clint was wrestled into submission and dragged away a moment later, her body shaking too badly to stand as the remaining two guards positioned themselves on either side of her cell.

One of them swiped a keycard, and Wanda finally got the message to _move_ from her brain to her legs as the door opened, desperately scrambling to get away from them.

She still couldn't get her shaking muscles to take her weight, however, so Wanda scooted herself back until her spine hit the wall, a frightened little noise getting knocked from her throat. Ross ducked into her cell a moment later, the remote to her shock collar held loosely in one hand.

"Easy, now," he muttered, holding the remote up in warning as he approached.

Wanda felt the burn of horrified tears behind her eyes, and she caught a little sob of breath, turning her head away to hide behind the messy curtain of her hair. No, no, no, _please_ , God...

"Come on, Maximoff," Ross said after a second, his voice missing some of its earlier bite. "Just come quietly."

Wanda shook her head, edging back toward the far corner of her cell as her chest heaved for breath.

"Please," she managed to choke out.

"You've got some tests scheduled," he said patiently.

Wanda shook her head again, tears brimming her eyes, and Ross began moving in her direction once again.

"Please," she begged again, pressing herself into the corner as he approached. "Please, I'm frightened..."

The man's pace slowed, something like confusion flickering over his face as Wanda blinked her tears free to crawl hot and wet over her cheeks.

"If you come quietly and do as you're told, you won't get shocked," Ross told her gently, but Wanda shook her head a little. The man let out a slow breath. "Maximoff..."

"You said you were going to dissect me," she choked out.

Ross grimaced.

"I said I _could_. Not that I was going to," he tried to reassure her. "You've been left in my charge. It's my job to make sure that you aren't harmed."

"Then why are you taking me to get my head cut open?"

She saw the man's jaw tense a little before he started moving again.

"It's just a few scans," he said quietly, crouching in front of her before steadily meeting her gaze. "We're not going to make any decisions today. We're just trying to figure out how your powers work."

"They'll hurt me..." she begged again, her throat tight. "They want to cut me up...Please, don't make me do this...I'm scared..."

Wanda ducked her head with a little sob, and felt his hand on her shoulder a moment later.

"Come on," he murmured. "It's okay. No one is making any decisions today."

She meekly let him help her to her feet, not bothering to smother back her tears. Clint had told her to play it up, after all. There was no point acting brave in this situation - it would do her no favors - so Wanda let herself cry.

This seemed to unnerve the man, who gently tried to hush her as he led her out of her cell and toward the hallway, the remote for her collar tucked away in his pocket. The two guards fell into step behind them, a couple yards back.

The halls passed by in a sickening blur as Wanda allowed herself to be led through the facility, her little sniffles and the echo of boots on tile the only sound that accompanied them.

Her tears had mostly run dry by the time they reached the lab, replaced by a dull apprehension that twisted in her stomach like something alive, trying to escape through her ribcage. Wanda flinched back as the door opened before her, bumping into Ross' chest, and she felt his hands come to rest on her shoulders, preventing escape.

The room was clearly an old storage closet, as some of the dingy filing cabinets and broken office chairs were still shoved up along the walls of the room to get them out of the way. In the center was what looked like a wooden cot, a faded grey blanket tossed across it and a light set up to shine down on it. In the corner of the room there was a device of some sort set up - it looked a little bit like a metal rolling cart with a desktop computer and printer, but it was hooked up to a metal pole on wheels, with a cross-bar at the top. The top bar had a light on one side, and just below the point where they connected, on the vertical pole, there was a switchboard with dozens of wires plugged in.

She swallowed hard as Ross led her to the cot and ordered her to sit, falling more than lowering herself to the flimsy mattress padding as her trembling knees gave out on her halfway through the action.

"You lot ready?" Ross asked, glancing around the room as the three men in lab coats bustled about.

"Yeah. She's not gonna be a problem, is she?"

"Shouldn't be," Ross replied, throwing her a pointed glance, and Wanda flinched away in apprehension. When he next spoke, however, his voice was a gentle command directed at her. "Lie down. Your head toward the computer."

Wanda tried to take another slow breath that came out as a sob, and carefully shifted herself around to lie across the cot, cold terror numbing her. She could feel her powers sparking at her fingertips in distress, the last traces of the calming drugs from the previous day just starting to wear off, but they were still present enough in her system to keep her from properly focusing her powers.

Even if she hadn't been drugged, however, the restraints had her hands crushed tight against her sides, her fingers bound in a point and unable to make the slightest move to direct the force of her magic. Even if she had been able to fight, she couldn't do much more than let out little uncontrolled bursts of power, which wouldn't be able to do enough damage before Ross pulled out the remote and zapped her unconscious.

The utter hopelessness of her situation crashed down on her then, and she sobbed in another little breath as one of the labcoat-wearing men approached her with a handful of wires, the metal pole clattering after him on uneven wheels.

The man paid her distress no mind as he settled himself at her side and began carding his fingers roughly through her hair, tugging it back from her face. Once he'd moved her hair out of the way, he took one of the diodes, checking a little tag on it for the number, and dipped into a thick, clear substance that he had in a jar.

Snapping her eyes shut, Wanda tried to bite back a whimper as the man's fingers brushed over her head once again, prodding along her scalp. She winced as the first diode was pressed into place, the end of it sticky and cold. The man held it in place for a long few seconds before drawing back to prepare another, leaving it firmly glued to her head.

The next few diodes went on fairly quickly, and the man easily fell into a pattern as he started on the ones up at the top of her head.

Ross paced slowly in the background as the man hooked her up, the other two scientists standing at the computer and telling the one at her side if he needed to move the diodes a little in any direction once he'd pressed them to her scalp.

Wanda felt sick with nerves, the straitjacket seeming like it was suffocating her. The wires were dragging heavily at her head, making her feel like her skull had been fastened down to the cot, and it was starting to make her claustrophobic. The heat from the overhead lamp was doing nothing to help that, and neither was the rough pulling on her hair from the guy in the lab coat. Each additional diode sent a shock of icy shivers down her spine that somehow did nothing to contrast the heat of the lamp.

Wanda whimpered as the man tugged sharply at a lock of her hair that had knotted itself around the head of a diode, and Ross glanced back at the noise, brows furrowed.

"Is there a problem?"

"Yeah. Her freaking hair. This would be much easier if we could simply shave her head," the lab tech muttered, and Ross let out a derisive snort.

"What do you think we run, a barber shop? Quit bitching and get her hooked up. You were hired to get results, not whine about less than ideal work conditions."

"We'll have to shave her head anyway when we put her under for surgery..." the man muttered sourly, moving a strand of Wanda's hair out of the way with a rather sharp tug. She allowed herself another little whimper of pain, and Ross glanced back with a scowl.

" _What_ are you doing to her?"

The lab tech opened his mouth, hesitating for a second as he tried to find words, but Ross beat him to it.

"You know what? Forget it. Just get her hooked up, would you? I don't have time for this."

The lab tech ducked his head in submission, looking scolded, and moved her hair a bit more gently to hook up the next diode.

Wanda forced herself to lie still and quiet as the remaining diodes were attached to her head, breathing in and out slowly as the light seared down onto her, making her feel overheated and queasy.

The collar felt like it was choking her.

The lab tech moved to join the others at the computer after attaching the final diode, and Ross stepped closer to her as a series of little beeps came from the machine. The system started up with a whir, and Wanda winced in anticipation of whatever was about to happen.

"It's all right," Ross murmured to her, hovering at her side as the men in lab coats bustled about. "Just try to relax. You'll be done in about five minutes."

Wanda took a shuddering breath, casting her gaze to the ceiling for a second before letting her eyes close, and feeling the hot drip of a tear running over her temple.

"It's not going to hurt," Ross murmured. "I promise."

She opened her eyes once again as she heard him moving away, turning her head to look back at where the men were all hovering around the computer.

"All right, that should be set to go."

"Do we need to have her use her powers?" Ross asked tensely, sending a wary look back at her, but the man in the lab coat who was controlling the keyboard shook his head.

"Her eyes are glowing. That should be plenty. The equipment is very precise."

Ross turned to begin pacing the room once more as the men in labcoats watched the screen, muttering among themselves.

Wanda jolted a little in surprise as one of them looked up at her with a glare.

"You. Witch. Lie straight and close your eyes," he snapped.

Wanda was quick to return her gaze to the ceiling, closing her eyes over as she measured her breathing and tried to stay calm despite the tears pricking behind her eyes.

She wanted Clint.

She wanted _Vision_.

She wanted to be out of this horrible place for good, and back home safe with her friends.

"You three have any results yet?" Ross asked from somewhere behind her, and there was a shift of movement from beside the computer.

"We're getting a lot of activity right around here. Let's try it without the input, see if there's any changes. Dixon, kill her powers."

Wanda looked back sharply as one of the men walked toward her, a needle full of some off-colored fluid in his hand. She didn't get a chance to protest before he had a hand pressed against the side of her head, turning it away from him and pinning her to the cot, and she felt the sharp pressure of the needle resting against the side of her neck as he lined up with a vein.

"Be a good girl and be very still for me," he muttered through gritted teeth, and Wanda yelped as she felt him push the needle in. She felt the injection, cold in her bloodstream, a few seconds before the world spun around her.

She was vaguely aware of the man drawing the needle out and taping a little patch of gauze to her neck before walking back to the others.

"All set. Give it a few seconds to really kick in."

Wanda took a deep breath, looking around in confusion as the world seemed to sway, the overhead lights blurring in her vision.

"What does that do?" she heard Ross ask from somewhere behind her.

"It's the drug she was put on following her little tantrum," one of the men replied, and Wanda let her head loll as she tried to think through the swirling. "It prevents her from focusing enough to use her powers. We just up the dose like so, and...ha! There. See? Eyes aren't glowing anymore. She can't think straight enough to use her powers."

"I assume this isn't something you could simply give her in a daily pill form...?"

"Not at these amounts. It's a very expensive combination of drugs, and if taken in high enough doses for a long enough period of time, there's the possibility that she could start to develop some immunity to it. It's much more economical in the long run to simply have her powers removed. Besides, pills can be skipped. She can't get her powers back once we surgically remove them. The UN doesn't want her causing any trouble, after all."

"No," Ross muttered, "I suppose not."

"We have a definitive read yet?"

"This whole patch has gone dark now," a new voice observed.

"It looks like it's centralized in the temporal lobes," a different man muttered. "Lucky for us. Removing those is a fairly common procedure - they do it for seizures. Well, they remove parts of them, anyway. When was the last time she ate? We could have her prepped in a couple hours and extract the lobes today without having to worry about too many complications."

Even through the haze of drugs, the words made her go tense.

Wanda shot a terrified glance over at the blurry form of Ross, hoping that at least some of the desperate pleading that she felt was carried over in her expression.

He met her gaze for a long second, his features closed off, before turning away from her and letting out a little breath.

"I want further testing," he muttered, going back to pacing the room. "We can't afford any mistakes, and I am not going to repeat this procedure because one test showed us a location that may not have been correct. Find another test, and run it again. I want cross-referenced results."

"Sir, we're not equipped for much more than this. More tests...that could take days."

"I don't care. I'm not going to risk making a mistake with a matter this... _delicate_ ," he finished. "If that is all we can do today, then that's all we can do. I'll return her to her cell. You lot better start making phone calls."

Wanda wanted to cry in relief.

"Yes, Sir, that's about all we can do."

"Fine. Get those diodes off of her."

Wanda didn't fight as one of the men came back to her side, using some slick, smelly liquid to remove the diodes from her scalp. She could feel little sticky patches catching in her hair still, but she was too busy trying to fight her way through the drugged haze to care.

Everything around her was still spinning, through not as badly as before, and she could concentrate enough to tense up different muscle groups in her body if she put her mind to it.

She could hear one of the men in the background talking quietly with Ross, and she caught a few words like "recovery time" "bone plate" "few hours" and "notable side effects," but they were keeping their voices too low for her to get any real information from them, especially with her thoughts drifting in and out like waves at a beach.

The man at her side tugged the last diode free with a frown.

"Would have been so much easier just to go with a complete lobotomy," he muttered in disgust as he stood. "None of this expensive messing around with EEG and whatever the fuck else that moron General comes up with..."

Wanda tried to watch him as he moved away, his words worrying her even through the haze, but Ross was crossing back toward her, motioning for her to sit up, and she refocused her attention on forcing herself upright without the use of her arms.

"Should I wait, or...?" Ross asked the men in concern as Wanda swayed dizzily and nearly fell right back over again, but the one at the computer was shaking his head.

"You should be good without a guard," he reassured Ross. "She's pretty high off her ass right now, I doubt she'd be able to use her powers even if she didn't have the straitjacket on."

Ross frowned a little, but reached to help Wanda to her feet.

The world swam around her for a long second as she staggered upright, and she wasn't aware of Ross all but holding her up until they'd nearly reached the door.

Her legs felt like rubber beneath her, the walls seeming to press in closer at the ceiling than the floor as she looked around dazedly. She felt weirdly numb, her relief ringing hollow with the prospect that her torment had only been delayed, and she glanced up at Ross as he paused at a closed door to dig through his pockets.

"No need to look so terrified," Ross muttered after a moment, swiping a key card to open the door. "A temporal resection is harmless, and shouldn't affect your mind at all. It's not like you're getting a lobotomy."

Wanda ducked her head with a little sniffle, her mind whirling with the attempt to translate the words into Sokovian. The procedures both sounded terrifying, from what she could piece together. Harmless or not, she didn't want to go through with either.

"Besides, if they find a way to remove them, you won't have to wear this anymore," he offered, tapping a finger on her shock collar. "And we could probably see about removing the straitjacket as well."

"So you'll let me out of my restraints, and all I have to do is allow you to destroy my mind," she asked, feeling sick. Her words were still a little slurred, but thankfully must have been clear enough for him to make out.

"Not destroy," he corrected softly. "Not even the UN could justify a procedure that crippled you. They can only break their own rules so much. If anything, you might get some mood swings or have trouble with your second language, but that's something that they've been ordered to avoid unless absolutely necessary."

"They don't care," she whispered in reply, the truth of her words sinking in as she said them. "They don't actually care what they do to my head, so long as it neutralizes me..."

Ross shifted a little beside her, giving a light tug to the bottom of his jacket to straighten out the wrinkles before running his hand back through his hair, shooting her a glance.

"Yeah, well, you're _my_ prisoners," he muttered sourly. "I get final say. I don't need them handing me back a damn vegetable to look after."

Wanda dropped her gaze to the ground once more. Somehow that wasn't especially reassuring.

The rest of the walk was spent in silence, Wanda blinking miserably at the floor as she was led back to her cell block, trying to fight her way through the drugs.

Although the concoction had packed a hard punch, walking seemed to have helped spread it through her system a bit more evenly, and by the time they reached her prison she was down to slight dizziness and mild distraction.

Not enough distraction, however, to prevent her from noticing that she was alone in the cell block.

Had they put her back in solitary?

The panic hit her hard for a second, and she recoiled as Ross tried to lead her forward, nearly pulling out of the startled man's grip.

"Come on, now, don't start," he warned, grabbing hold of one of the straps on her jacket firmly.

"Where are the others?" she dared to ask, hating how tiny and scared her voice sounded.

"They've been sent to get some exercise, to cool them down a bit. They'll be back in half an hour or so. Come on, now."

She didn't resist the firm grip on her shoulder as Ross marched her back to her cell and led her inside. He carefully lowered her to the cot before stepping back and digging for his key card once more. Wanda let her weight drag her onto her side and curled up in a little ball of misery, burying her face against her knees. A tiny sob shook her, and she only curled herself tighter in response.

That was it, then. She was going to have her brain cut out so she wouldn't be able to use her powers.

The ghost of a touch on her shoulder made her jerk her head up reflexively. Ross stepped back a pace sharply as she did, his eyes wide and his hand in the air where he'd been reaching for her. There was something like mild horror etched onto his face, and it took Wanda a long second to realize that her eyes were likely glowing with her distress.

A very vivid reminder to anyone who saw her that she was not human.

Realizing that her only shot at escaping this awful procedure had probably just been blown, Wanda curled back into a ball with a little sob.

Barton had been wrong. She was a fool to have ever thought that Ross would see past her powers.

He saw her as a walking weapon, just like Tony Stark did.

Wanda didn't bother looking up as she heard him move away from her, her vision blurring in shades of blue as she stared down at her prison clothes. She heard him let out a little sigh as he stepped out of her cell, closing the door over with a swish a moment later.

"Sir!"

The muted voice - new, and younger, sounding distinctly panicked - echoed from down the hall. Her curiosity got the better of her, and Wanda peeked over her hip into the cell bay, blinking her vision clear.

"General Ross!"

The man was looking at her with an odd expression on his face, but glanced back over his shoulder as a guard jogged into the room, the young man's face pale.

Ross straightened up, turning fully around to address the soldier.

"Report."

"Sir..." the man said nervously, looking between him and Wanda. "There's a message for you from the UN. Something's..." he swallowed hard, going a bit paler. "Something's come up..."

* * *

"Captain."

Steve looked up as T'Challa strode into the room, a bemused expression clouding his face.

"Your Majesty?"

"I believe you had better see this for yourself."

Steve pushed himself to his feet, an icy feeling of dread writhing in his stomach as he was hit by the fleeting thought that something may have happened to Bucky in cryostasis. But as he followed the king, however, it became clear that they were not heading for the wing of the palace where his medical team was set up.

A few minutes later Steve found himself in what looked like an office, with a few people hovering nervously about a computer.

"I received an email this morning that I think you should see," T'Challa explained, his words causing the people to move aside so that Steve could make his way to the chair and sit in front of the computer. The email was open on the screen, half of the attached documents already pulled up from the other people's inspection.

Steve slowly clicked through the extensive diagrams and blocked-out schedules, his eyebrows climbing toward his hairline as he examined them more closely.

"What am I looking at here?" he asked, glancing up at the King.

"It slipped our server's protection this morning, signed as being from 'a Friend;' however, I can't think of anyone who would send me something like this. It's someone who knows what they're doing with a computer, for certain. It seems to be schematics for some prison, but the coordinates given are in the middle of the ocean... We were hoping that you may be able to glean more from it than we could."

"It's the team," Steve whispered, looking over a blueprint for a prison block with little red 'X's drawn over four of the cells.

One of the cells had a number of circles drawn around it for emphasis, as well as a star that referenced a page of information about operating and disarming something that rather looked like a shock collar, and Steve felt a smile start to spread across his face.

There was only one of his teammates who would need something like that to contain them.

And only one other person on the outside who would have this much drive to see her released.

Steve looked up, meeting T'Challa's curious gaze with a grin.

"I think I know just who sent it to us."


	12. Chapter 12

Wanda stared at the opposite wall of her cell, seeing nothing.

At her throat, the collar blinked red as electricity pulsed on its lowest setting - not enough to make her muscles convulse too badly, but enough to send little vibrations through her nerve endings and scatter her thoughts.

Security had been upped the day before, the guards walking around like nervous lapdogs, jumping and growling at every shadow. There were armed men both inside and outside of their holding bay, and extra guards tramping up and down the halls. The calming drugs she was being given had been doubled in dosage, leaving her too tired to move around and too woozy to really focus her thoughts at all.

Not that the electricity would let her.

The warden had come in one morning, raving about the systems showing signs of interference, and that everyone needed to be on high alert for an attack.

And that apparently included the prisoners.

"I want them compliant," the man had said. So their routine had been altered.

The three men had been put on minimal rations of food and exercised twice daily, forced to run laps until they were too exhausted to do anything beside sleep upon returning to their cells. The normal chatter that they shared to keep up their spirits was quickly replaced with exhausted silence.

The warden had wanted Wanda under tighter control as well, but the guards were too afraid to let her out of her cell, so they'd gotten creative. The lower-voltage shocks would disrupt her focus without locking up her muscles too badly, so they'd set it on a cycle. Every thirty seconds or so the collar would go off, causing her to tense and lose focus, and this was repeated all day. At night they drugged her unconscious, not trusting her to sleep on her own.

This left her too exhausted to fight or even move, with her body aching all over in protest and her muscles trembling from the constant strain. It was worse than being exercised until she was physically exhausted, because here she could find no relief.

Ross had been by again as well, to supervise a blood draw, but apparently the additional drugs in her system were messing up the results too much for them to be of any use, and he'd forbidden any more procedures for the time being. This made the lab techs from the UN quite nervous, but Ross was adamant. He wasn't going to allow a surgery based off a guess, especially one that was made while she was high on their calming drugs. If they didn't successfully remove her powers, there was no point to the procedure.

It was a mild relief that felt near insignificant when held up to her current condition.

The collar blinked again and a burst of mental static later Wanda found herself staring at the concrete before her, feeling lost as her body ached in protest.

Was this what it felt like to be brain dead? Unable to hold a thought for more than a few seconds before she found herself staring at a wall, wondering what had happened and trying to piece her surroundings together for the five hundredth time through the pain?

She let her head tilt a little to the side, the feel of the glue that the lab techs had used still sticky in patches across her skull. It was apparently pretty sturdy stuff, because even after a few hurried washes every other day when she was allowed to shower - the few moments a week when she wasn't drugged half out of her skull - it had refused to come out.

Ross hadn't been back since the blood draw, either, and Wanda wasn't sure if that was because they'd had trouble finding another test to run, or of they figured her current state of restraint was plenty to deal with her.

After all, it wasn't like she could cause trouble right now, even if she wanted to. She was helpless.

Helpless to turn away from the wary, inquisitive stares of the soldiers on patrol, helpless to do anything but open her mouth obediently when a trembling and wide-eyed guard came in to feed her after losing the lottery draw with his shift mates, unable to reply to Clint with anything more than softer and softer whimpers when his tired voice called over to her every few hours to ask if she was okay...

She couldn't even cover her ears to stop the awful, high-pitched ringing that had just started up.

Wanda winced as her head ached at the shrill tone, but she was hit by another burst of static before she could properly register the sound. As her thoughts cleared up again, however, Wanda realized that the ringing wasn't in her head.

It was the prison alarms.

She looked up groggily as the lights went down, plunging her cell into relative darkness, and the guards around them began to shout at one another in a panic.

One of the younger ones ran to the door of her cell, pointing a gun at her through the glass, and shouted for her to stop.

Wanda blinked slowly, tilting her head as she tried to figure out what she was doing that he wanted her to discontinue. An older guard hauled the young man away a moment later, lecturing him nervously as he eyed the cell bay doors.

Wanda let herself slump back against the wall, blinking up at the darkened lights above her head.

She was so tired...maybe it was close to night, and she would be allowed to black out for a few hours after a shot of sedative.

The collar went off again, and Wanda blinked her senses back into focus in time to hear Clint calling to her, his voice forced over his obvious exhaustion.

"Wanda! Wanda, can you hear me? Hey, kid! C'mon, talk to me... The hell did you people do to her, why won't she answer?"

"Shut it, Barton," one of the guards snapped, shifting his weight as he looked around nervously.

"No! I want to know what the hell you've drugged her with!"

"She's been medicated for her condition, nothing more," a different guard said sharply, voice tense. "Now do what he said and be quiet, before we come in there and shut you up physically."

"For her 'condition'? That is _such_ bullshit-"

"Clint." It was Sam's voice this time, weary and soft. "Just let it go. She's fine, I can see her from my cell. They haven't given her anything new. Don't harass the guards."

"They've all got twitchy fingers cause of the power outage," Scott muttered sourly.

"They've had twitchy fingers since Ross showed up with those UN goons..." Clint growled.

Wanda winced as another burst of static caught her, and blinked her world back into focus just as the backup lights flickered.

The cell bay doors opened with a swish, and the guards all shouted as one, turning their guns on the doorway. Then the backup lights all went dark.

There were shouts, bangs, the crack of a gun going off once, twice, three times before it went flying across the room, knocked from the guard's hands. Clint and Sam and Scott were all shouting as well, at least one of them banging on the glass, and the guards were hollering to one another in the dark, their tones desperate with fright.

There was noise from everywhere but none of it made sense, and Wanda wanted to cover her ears but couldn't because her hands were trapped.

Another pulse, and she was once again staring at concrete, absently aware that there was noise around her.

And then, just as soon as it had started, there was silence.

For a long moment, there was nothing but darkness and quiet, and then a little trill of beeps sounded from somewhere out in the cell bay.

The backup lights flickered a little before coming back online, a few emergency LEDs along the floor lighting up, and Wanda watched them starburst in her blurry vision with rapt interest as she blinked slowly down at them.

The soft voices from down by Sam's cell didn't pull her attention away, and neither did the hiss of a cell door sliding open.

What _did_ catch her attention, though, was Sam's disbelieving laugh.

She hadn't heard him laugh in so long...

Scott must have told a joke, or something, because a second later Clint was laughing too, calling out to her in happy excitement. Scott whooped, and she heard a heavy, hollow thumping sound that was very familiar but she couldn't quite place...

And then there was someone standing outside of her cell, swiping a key card to open the door.

Another burst of static.

As her thoughts slowly drifted into place she found her senses clearing to reveal someone cradling her in their arms, lining a tube-like object up at her shoulder. She whimpered sharply as she felt something sharp prick her arm through the straitjacket, sending her senses swirling dizzily. When they began to clear up again, she could make out a man's voice, talking to her quietly.

"Wanda? God, please answer me... can you hear me, kid? Wanda?"

She blinked groggily as the person sat her up, eyes focused on the chest of whoever was holding her as she felt a big, warm hand cradle her cheek.

The person wasn't in a guard uniform, so it couldn't be one of the soldiers, and Ross always wore a business suit, so this wasn't him back to get her for more tests...the prisoners all had uniforms on as well, and the man holding her wasn't wearing blue, so this wasn't Clint or Sam or Scott...

Wanda tried to tilt her head up to see who was holding her, the effort taking far more energy than her stiff muscles should have needed. A face swirled in her vision for a moment, and she squinted a little as she tried to register who was holding her.

"I don't think the adrenaline is working...Wanda...come on, kiddo..." the person murmured, his thumb stroking over her cheek. "Wake up..."

"Get that damn collar off of her!" another voice shouted, the swish of a prison door opening in the background, and Wanda felt large hands clumsily try to unfasten her collar as it pulsed again.

Static.

Wanda blinked her sight clear, finding a man leaned overtop of her with his fingers dug into the collar around her neck. She tried to hum out a questioning noise, but it came out as a whimper.

"Almost got it," he murmured soothingly. "Just hang in there."

"We're gonna run ahead, clear your path. Bring her as soon as she can stand," someone called, and the man holding her grunted in reply.

A second later she heard a little click.

There was no more static.

She felt a large, warm hand come up to cup her cheek once more, tilting her head back, and she blinked up into familiar blue eyes.

Vision's name came to the tip of her tongue unbidden, and she stared hard at her rescued for a moment before her brain caught up and supplied her with the correct name.

"Steve?"

Her voice was raspy and weak, but that didn't stop the super soldier from giving her a blinding grin before hugging her close.

"Yeah, sweetheart. It's me. You're safe now," he murmured. "I'm getting you out of here."

Thank God. Oh, thank God. He'd come back.

"Steve..." she murmured again, nuzzling her face into his shoulder as she felt tears well in her eyes.

"Yep. I'm here," he murmured, leaned over her shoulder as he fiddled with the buckles on her straitjacket. "Let's get this horrible thing off of you..."

"I thought you forgot us," she rasped, her head lolling against him as her senses whirled again, the drugs in her system trying to drag her back under.

"I'm sorry I took so long," he replied gently. "I had to track some people down and get a team together to get you all out. But you're all safe now. Okay? I'm getting you all out of here. I've got a jet waiting."

Wanda allowed him to draw the straitjacket from her arms, stretching her sore limbs and flexing her fingers as he tossed it away. With the top layer gone, she was left in her thin blue prison shirt and the sweater that Vision had brought her well over a week ago - she'd refused to be parted from it for even a moment - and she shivered a little in the cool prison air as Steve helped her to stagger out of her cell.

"Scott," Steve called, flagging the man down from where he stood guarding the cell bay. Steve lowered her gently to the ground as Scott darted over.

"What can I do for you, Captain, Sir?"

"I need you to double check the connections on this thing. Make sure it's not gonna zap her again. Here's the schematic."

A moment later Wanda found herself looking into a pair of concerned, hazel-green eyes as gentle hands soothed over her shoulders and eased the collar away from her neck.

"Scott," she breathed.

"Oh, thank God, you're okay! Well, not _okay_ , obviously, but I'm glad you're out of that cell. Let me make sure this damn thing is off...just hold still, Wanda, you can count on me. I... _can_ call you Wanda, right? Or should it be Miss Maximoff, cause I mean we haven't known each other that long and I haven't exactly established what I should address you by cause everything got pretty scrambled pretty quick at the airport, so I've just been calling you by your first name cause that's what the other two call you, and I mean we've just been through hell together - comparatively, that is, I'm sure you had it way worse than I did cause nobody tried to experiment on me and I'm rambling aren't I? I'll just shut up. I talk way too much when I get nervous, Hope tells me that all the time. She says-"

Wanda felt an affectionate little smile tug at her lips as Scott babbled on, his fingers working at the collar to make sure all of the electronics were properly disconnected as Steve paced in the background, checking the unconscious guards to make sure they weren't hurt too badly.

Clint and Sam's cells were open, but the two men were nowhere to be seen.

"Clint?" she rasped, looking around.

"He went ahead with Sam. They're gonna clear the hall, make sure we've got a straight line to the jet," Steve said, crossing back to her side and dropping to a knee. "I gave you a shot earlier to help fight some of those drugs in your system, but I don't know if you'll be able to do much with your powers. That being the case, we're going to try to keep you out of fights, at least until you're a bit more awake."

Wanda nodded, and Steve turned his attention to Scott.

"You almost got that turned off?"

"Yep. Just a few more connections...they really rigged the hell out of this thing. I mean seriously. This is just unnecessary. Why do there need to be four of these?"

Steve and Wanda glanced at one another over Scott's shoulder, and Steve gave her a reassuring smile as the thief tugged a wire free from the collar.

"There. That should do it."

"All right. Let's get you on your feet, kiddo," Steve murmured, carefully helping Wanda upright. Scott was quick to dart to her other side, slinging an arm around her waist for balance as she steadied herself.

"Steve!"

Clint and Sam came running back into the room before they could move more than a few steps, both men out of breath and tense.

"We got incoming. Guards coming up from the lower levels. They must have broken through your system hack, we gotta roll _now_ ," Sam said, darting a look over his shoulder as a distant shout echoed down the hall.

Wanda could only stumble along dizzily as Steve practically swept her up with one arm and carried her out of the cell bay, Scott and Clint at his heels.

Sure enough, about a dozen prison guards were running down the hall toward them, more pouring out of the stairwell doors. Steve muttered a mild curse under his breath, moving her so that she could balance herself against the wall before whirling to face their oncoming enemies and dropping into a fighting stance.

Wanda took a deep breath, trying to clear her head as Steve charged into a fight behind her, joining Scott. Up ahead Sam and Clint were engaging with a small group of guards, the two men standing back to back as they deflected the guard's attacks with practiced ease. She could hear the hollow thump of punches being thrown, the grunts and groans of men nursing bruises and concussions as the rogue Avengers rained hell on them, and she closed her eyes for a moment, trying to clear up her senses as her swaying vision threatened to put her on the ground.

Whatever Steve had injected her with was starting to help, but there was enough of the calming drug still left in her system from the past week of double doses to have her woozy still.

Gentle hands grabbed her shoulders, startling her, and she jerked her head up to find herself looking into the dark eyes of a very out-of-breath Sam Wilson.

"You good?" he asked her, eyes darting over her shoulder to where Steve was fighting. "Can you walk?"

Wanda forced herself to nod, but before Sam could scoop an arm around her shoulders, he was snatched away. She looked up in time to see a beefy guard lock an arm around Sam's throat, tightening it until he made a choking sound and holding the Falcon as he flailed, trying desperately to land a hit.

"Sam!" she cried in fright.

Sam struggled for a moment to no avail - he was still too tired and malnourished from prison to do any serious damage with his hits - and the guard landed a solid punch to his ribcage that made him wheeze. Panicked, Wanda staggered away from the wall, desperate to help him as Sam gasped for breath.

She tried to summon up her powers as the guard pinned Sam to the ground, but the only thing she was able to do was conjure up a slight glow at her fingertips. Frustrated, Wanda balled her hands together in a fist and brought them down on top of the guard's head as hard as she could. Her weakened blow was barely enough to stun the man, but the distraction was all Sam needed to throw the guard off and finally land a solid punch to his temple, putting him out cold.

Barely a second later Sam was sweeping her off down the hall, shielding her from attacks. She tried to protest, to turn him around so they could help Scott and Steve, but Sam wasn't having it.

"Got to get you out of here, kid," he muttered, deflecting one guard's punch into a second guard as they ducked between the two. "Can't have them getting a hold of you in this state."

Her protest was cut off by the sharp crackle of electricity and Wanda went rigid on instinct, terror shooting like ice through her veins.

Sam slowed his pace, glancing back over his shoulder and muttering a curse.

One of the guards was coming at them, a stun baton held in his hand and sizzling with electricity. Wanda's breath choked in her throat and she staggered a pace back as Sam moved to stand in front of her, blocking the guard's path.

"Clint!" he shouted over his shoulder, backing her up as he slowly retreated from the man with the baton. "Could use a hand over here!"

The guard charged before Sam could say another word, but Wanda's eyes were locked on the baton, her shaking hands grasping at her collar in fright. She tried to tell herself to move as Sam wrestled with the guard, to force her rigid muscles to start working again, but the only thing she could hear was the pounding of blood in her ears and the harsh, burning sizzle of electricity waiting to sear through her.

The guard landed a lucky punch, making Sam stagger for just long enough for him to get by, and Wanda's breath caught hard and burning in her throat as the man charged straight for her.

She tried to turn and run but she was still slow and uncoordinated, and didn't make it more than a few steps before the guard caught up.

Wanda cried out as the end of his baton struck her, sending an agonizing shock through her body, and for a long second everything swamped in black. The only thing she knew was that her body was convulsing and she was on the floor, the cold tile burning like ice against her skin. She was vaguely aware of people shouting, somebody touching her, gathering her up, moving her, and by the time her senses started to seep back to her through the haze she was being gently set down in some kind of small room.

A pair of hands cupped her face, tilting her head up, and as she blinked the world back into focus she found herself staring into Clint's eyes.

"Look at me," he murmured, stroking one thumb across her cheek as his eyes darted, taking in her face. "Just try to focus on me, okay? We're gonna' get you out of here. Try to stay awake for me."

"Clint..."

She wasn't sure what she was asking for, or even if she was asking anything at all, but the man responded by hugging her tight against his chest for a long second and rubbing his hand up and down her back.

"You're gonna be okay, kid. Steve's here. You're safe now. Try to stay awake...you just have to get to the jet, okay? That's all you've gotta do."

He stood then, backing a pace away, and Wanda's lagging brain finally snapped back into focus. She recognized her surroundings. He'd put her on the elevator.

"We'll be right behind you, Wanda, I promise," Clint said, stepping back into the hall.

"Clint!" she cried, trying to struggle to her feet.

"Get to the jet," he commanded again, leaning inside to scan a card and hit one of the top floor buttons before turning to face the oncoming guards once more.

Wanda managed to stagger to her feet as the elevator doors slid closed, but the jarring slide of it kicking into motion made her fall against the wall as it started to ascend.

"Clint!" she cried again, but it was hopeless. She was already moving.

Wanda turned to the button panel, hoping to somehow stop it, but to her frustration it was keycard restricted. She couldn't even go back for them.

"No..." she whispered, leaning heavily against the wall as she watched the numbers tick higher. "No, no, no..."

With worry settling sick and heavy in her stomach, Wanda let her weight take her to the floor of the elevator, curling into herself.

She was on her own again.


	13. Chapter 13

The elevator rattled to a stop on the third floor, the doors opening to reveal a small, dark room with off-white cabinets and beat-up wood tables. It looked like some kind of break room for the guards, with large lockers lining one wall and a little coffee machine and microwave set up in the far corner.

Wanda forced herself to her feet and stumbled out of the elevator.

The lights in the prison were still out, the backup lights casting odd, underlit glows on everything in a haze of grey, and she looked around in confusion for a long moment as the elevator slid closed behind her.

She was on the third floor. The landing bay was on the first. Clint must have hit the wrong button.

Wanda turned around and pressed the button to call the elevator back up, but the panel flashed a red light at her, denying her access without a key card.

Muttering a curse, and still feeling numb, she turned to look around.

The room she was in had two exits, one that led to another set of rooms, and the other to a short hallway that ended in a turn. The sign at the end of the hall labeled it as a stairwell, so Wanda took her chance in that direction, stumbling a little as she tried to shake the drugs' hold from her thoughts. The area was silent, the only sounds her own footsteps and the wailing of a siren a few floors above her, and Wanda tried to keep her movements quiet, acutely aware of any noise she made.

She peeked around the turn in the hall before rounding it, just to be sure the coast was clear, and found herself staring at a doorway. Cautiously, she pushed the door open a few inches, looking around to be sure the coast was clear before starting to edge her way onto the landing.

The sudden echo of shouts from somewhere in the stairwell, however, sent her heart rocketing into her throat, and Wanda ducked back onto the third floor in a panic.

The guards had beaten her to the stairs.

Wanda doubled back to the elevator, her pulse ringing in her ears.

As she'd seen just a moment ago, she was in no state to fight, so she would have to avoid confrontation.

She once again found herself in the little break room, staring at the sealed elevator doors, trapped. Taking a slow breath to gather her woozy thoughts, Wanda looked around.

Perhaps one of the guards had a spare key card in their locker, and she could simply take the elevator to the top floor. Or even take it back down to collect her teammates instead of leaving them to fight their way up the stairs.

Wanda crossed over to the lockers, beginning to go down the line, opening them. Most were unlocked, a handful of them either empty or containing a jacket with equally empty pockets, and she was in the middle of trying to summon enough of her powers to force a tiny padlock open when she heard something mechanical whirring behind her.

It took her a long second to figure out what the sound was and where it was coming from, but it hit her like a jolt when her brain finally registered the sound.

It was the elevator.

She whirled around in joy, darting over to the doors as quickly as her dizziness would allow. Her teammates were okay!

Just as she reached it, however, her drug-hazy mind caught up with her, and she remembered that her teammates would all assume she was on the top level.

And then common sense kicked in with a chill of terror as she realized that it wasn't necessarily her teammates who were in the elevator.

She whirled around immediately, scanning the room for a hiding place as the floor level on the display slowly ticked down toward three. The only place that she could think to hide were in one of the cabinets - which she wasn't entirely sure she could fit in - and the lockers that lined the wall.

It took her less than a second to pick.

Wanda had just enough time to stuff herself into one of the less-crowded lockers and close the door over behind her before a little chime sounded and she made out the hiss of the elevator opening.

"-still don't have a location on any of the escaped prisoners. You two check this level, we're going up to level two. Sweep the stairwells on your way up and close in on the top floor. If nothing else we'll corner them on the landing deck."

"Yes, Sir."

Wanda held her breath as she heard the tramp of feet through the room, listening for the sound of the elevator closing and moving upward with a whir. The voice that had spoken had sounded an awful lot like Secretary Ross, and she could only imagine that he had been put in charge of all of them being re-captured.

A shift of movement in the room drew her attention, and Wanda held her breath as she listened to the two men moving around.

"You want to split up, or stick together?" one of the people - a deep-voiced man - asked.

"Have you never seen a horror movie? _Ever?_ " the other one hissed. "Stick together so the monsters can't pick us off, idiot. The last thing I need is to get my ass cornered by one of those maniacs and have you twiddling your thumbs two rooms over waiting for me to catch up."

"Fine. Left or right?"

"This way."

Wanda bent forward to see out the ventilation shafts in the locker, trying to watch what direction the men were moving in, but she didn't notice the light pressure of her sleeve catching as she leaned close.

A magnet fell off the locker door and hit the metal floor by her foot with a loud clack, knocked loose by her cuff, and the sound sent her heart rocketing up into her throat in terror.

"Shit! You hear that?" one of the men asked, the volume of his voice increasing as he crossed back into the room in a hurry.

"Someone's in here. Split up, look for them. We have permission to shoot on sight."

Wanda clapped her hands firmly over her mouth, trying to slow her breathing.

She recognized the voices now.

It was the men that Ross had brought from the UN. Or, at least, two of them. The third must have gone with Ross up a floor.

Her heart was pounding loud in her chest as she leaned to see if she could spot them between the narrow ventilation cuts, praying that they wouldn't be too thorough in their search.

"I knew we should have just done it," a deep voice hissed from barely a foot away, and Wanda pressed herself as far back into the locker as she could as she heard a gun click, her throat tight with terror. "Her, and then the rest of them. Neutralize them before they became any more of a problem. None of this stupid messing around with bullshit tests..."

"Don't yell at me, I wasn't the one who said to hold off. I would have been happy to get it over with, too. We're talking about the witch who mind-raped Tony Stark...you don't mess around with prisoners like that. The guy _warned_ us about her when he stopped in!"

"Seriously. She turned on her own teammates first chance she got," the first man muttered, kicking something over. "The hell did Ross think, that if he played nice she wasn't going to come after us the minute she got loose?"

"Idiot. Now the whole damn prison is at risk..."

"I told you, didn't I? We should have taken the witch's powers while we had the chance, regardless of what he said. His judgment's always been shit with stuff like this, that's how we wound up with Banner, and Blonsky, and about a hundred dead in Harlem!"

Wanda choked back a whimper as she heard footsteps approaching the lockers.

"What were we supposed to do, stuff her in a suitcase and smuggle her out? We aren't exactly equipped to perform surgery here. It's a prison, not a hospital. Their little nurse's office doesn't even have anesthetic."

A cabinet banged shut.

"Could have gone for the old-fashioned method. They've already got her hooked up with the electricity."

"You want to lose your license?" a voice asked from just beside her, and Wanda swallowed hard as she heard a locker somewhere down the line open. "Yeah, I didn't think so."

"I'd rather not die, either, but that's looking like the only option we've left ourselves with."

"Not if we put a bullet in her first."

Another locker opened, this one closer.

Wanda rubbed her fingers together, desperately trying to summon her powers as she heard the man take a step over, putting him just outside of the locker she was in.

"You're assuming that we'll be able to get a shot in. From what I heard, she can stop bullets."

"Fucking hell. I knew we should have just cut her powers out of her on day one, the General's orders be damned..."

The man opened the locker door with a sharp jerk of motion, a strangled gasp of shock leaving his mouth as he caught sight of her, and Wanda grabbed his temples with her hands, slamming her magic into him as hard as she could, clawing into his brain and locking him in place before he could pull the trigger of his gun. He fought her possession for a long second, and Wanda grit her teeth as she struggled to hold her concentration through the haze of drugs.

"What?!" the other man asked from across the room, voice tense. "What happened? Why'd you gasp?"

Wanda moved her lips, forcing words from the man's mouth as she used her magic to lower his arm to his side, so the muzzle of his gun was no longer resting on her solar plexus.

"Nothing. Just some coats. Scared myself because I thought something was in here."

"Quit fucking around, you're gonna give me a heart attack. Come on, there's nothing here. Let's finish sweeping this floor and catch up to the others."

Wanda turned the man around with trembling hands, her magic pulsing hot through her veins as she made him close the locker over and follow his companion out of the room.

Dragging the memory of seeing her in the locker from his head was like pulling Velcro off of a wool rug, and she was gasping for breath from the effort by the time she succeeded in convincing him that he'd completely imagined seeing the Scarlet Witch.

She didn't dare move for a long moment after that, shaking so badly that she had to lean on the side of the locker to prevent herself sliding to the ground. The two were still arguing in hissed voices as they moved to look through another small room, getting further away with each passing second, and Wanda let her head fall back against the cool metal in relief.

That had been _way_ too close.

Her nerves were singing with the adrenaline boost from the close call, helping to chase the drugged haze to the back of her head, and Wanda forced herself to her feet as soon as she was sure they could take her weight without her knees buckling.

She couldn't stay here. It wasn't safe.

Wanda staggered out into the room, shooting one final glance after the men before turning in the direction of the hallway and stumbling into a run.

The jet. She had to get to the jet.

She would have to risk the stairs.

* * *

"What do you mean Wanda isn't there?"

"I haven't seen her," the voice replied through the static of the com. "She hasn't come to the landing pad."

"Shit, where is she?" Clint hissed, hands clenching down at his sides as Sam and Steve peeked around doorways to make sure the coast was clear.

"You sure she didn't get lost?" Scott asked quietly.

"Not that many places to get lost, not unless she tried to come back for us."

"You told her to go straight for the jet, right?" Sam asked.

"I did, but she might have done something dumb like double back for us if she thought we were in danger. Even without her powers working right," Clint groaned.

"That elevator was one-way without a key card. She would have had to take the stairs."

"So what do we do?"

"We split up," Steve said, glancing around. "There are only so many ways she could have gone. We each pair up and take one stairway, and search from there. Hopefully one of us will have found her by the time we hit the top. We're still waiting on the rest of our crew as is."

"Roger," Sam muttered. "Clint, come on. Let's check the far staircase. Meet you at the top, Cap."

"Be careful," Steve warned them. "The guards have had some time, they're starting to regroup. Watch your backs."

"Roger that, Captain."

With a final nod, Clint and Sam split off down the hall, and Scott followed Steve up the nearest set of stairs at a jog.

* * *

Wanda ran up the stairs as quickly and quietly as her trembling limbs would allow, using the railing to help drag her exhausted body up each step. The echoes of the guards' voices were a good few stories below her, and she couldn't make out what they were saying, but the last thing she needed was for any of them to notice her and catch up, or try shooting at her. She'd be as good as dead.

Her powers were trying to fight through the drug haze, reacting to her panic and condensing in the air around her, tinting it the slightest bit scarlet, but it was all show. Taking over the guard's mind, even for a short time, had completely exhausted her. She doubted she'd be able to lift so much as a pencil with her mind at this point, much less redirect a bullet or throw an attacker back.

Wanda heaved out a breath in relief as she finally reached the top landing, the First Floor sign on the door announcing her success like a beacon.

From here it was only a matter of finding the landing pad and boarding the jet, defending it until the rest of her team could get there.

Wanda carefully pushed the door open, peeking down the hall before stepping onto the top floor and letting the door slowly close behind her. Wanda set a sharp pace down the hallway, the floodlights passing in a blur as she focused on the little bend at the end of the hall.

She was almost there. She'd almost made it.

Wanda rounded the corner at the end of the hall and froze sharply, finding herself staring down the muzzle of a gun.

Secretary Ross was behind the weapon, his aim steady on her and his finger curled around the trigger, and for a split second Wanda could do nothing but stare at him in terror.

 _Fuck._

* * *

 **Author's Note:** Sorry for the delay, I wrote myself into a really bad corner and I've been having trouble getting out of it.


	14. Chapter 14

**Author's Note:** At long last, I manage to get my shit together and crank out a chapter for this. Sorry for the delay, there's been a LOT of stuff that came up. (Namely some very sickly rescue kittens.) Enjoy!

* * *

"Oh, shit," Sam gasped, ducking low and covering his head with his hands as gunfire echoed loud in the stairwell. "Clint, I think we got company!"

"Yeah, I noticed."

"We've got no cover out here," Sam said through gritted teeth, pressing himself in against the wall as the guards tried to shoot him through the railing from a few floors below.

"Noticed that too, thanks," the archer replied with a wry grin."Let's get some cover, then, shall we?"

Clint turned and sprinted the last few steps onto the nearest platform, running onto the fifth floor with a motion for Sam to follow. Muttering a curse, he darted up the stairs after Clint, trying to keep his head low. He followed the man through the door and slammed it shut behind him, glancing around for something to prop against it and keep it closed.

"Sam!"

He glanced back over his shoulder to find Clint hiding behind a desk, waving him over. The space they'd ducked into looked like some kind of communications hub, with a little maze of desks set up in a room wallpapered by blue screens that served as the only source of light. He was quick to run to the archer's side, sliding in behind the desk.

"What's the plan?"

"Get me shit to throw."

"Like what?"

" _Anything_. The heavier the better!"

Sam peeked up over the desk, spotting a central table with some office supplies as Clint yanked open a desk drawer behind him, and Sam scampered to sweep a few staplers, a couple heavy-duty tape dispensers, a hole punch, and an old pencil sharpener into his grip before stumbling back to where the archer was hiding.

"Dude, I hope you know what you're doing, cause they have _guns_."

"And you've got a deadshot," the man grinned.

Sam didn't get a chance to reply, the echo of gunfire punching through the steel door sending them both ducking behind the desk.

A second later the guards were flooding the room, and Sam shot a look at Clint.

The man simply gave him a grin, hefting one of the tape dispensers in his hand, and whipped up onto his knees to launch it across the room.

There was a rather satisfying thud from somewhere off behind them as Clint ducked back under the desk, and one of the guards yelped out a curse as someone shot the computer monitor on the desk above them.

Sam grabbed one of the paperweights that Clint had managed to dig out of the desk, lobbing it at a guard who was trying to skirt the edge of the room and get around behind them. The man ducked Sam's throw, floundering to re-aim his gun, and Clint dropped the young man to the floor with a well-aimed computer keyboard.

Clint took out two of the other guards shortly after, one with the other tape dispenser, and one with a water bottle. Then he retreated under the desk to paw through his remaining projectiles.

"How many more?" Clint asked him, testing the weight of a computer mouse before discarding it.

Sam peeked up over the top of the desk, glancing around.

"Two, far corner. One under the desk to the left. Another five over by the far door, but they don't look armed," he reported, ducking back behind the desk once more.

Clint took one of the staplers, half-pressed it down and forced it back up so that it jammed, and then fiddled for a second with the spring release.

"Two in the corner...?"

"Yeah."

"Got it."

The man rocked up onto his knees, taking a second to aim as the men shouted and pointed and the ones with guns scrambled to redirect them, and then he let the stapler fly.

It hit one of the young men standing in the corner in the face, the force of the blow un-jamming the staple and triggering the spring-release, which whipped the bar of the stapler open into the other man's temple, dropping them both.

Sam turned to give Clint an open-mouthed, incredulous look, and found the other man already digging for another projectile.

"What," he shrugged with a troublemaking grin, "you thought I was only good with arrows?"

Sam simply blinked in surprise as Clint lobbed another stapler with deadly accuracy, slamming one of the armed men in the forehead and knocking him out.

"Dude, remind me never to piss you off."

The archer snorted in amusement.

"I'll be sure to do that. How's it look behind us?"

Sam peeked over the desk once more, and was quick to duck down when he heard something hit the wood right beside him.

"Looks clear."

Clint nodded, testing the weight of the hole-punch.

"Make a run for the door on my signal. I'll clear these morons out, you keep looking for Wanda."

"Got it."

Sam took a slow breath, preparing himself, and Clint held up five fingers, ticking them down.

Four.

Three.

Two.

One.

Sam ran.

* * *

Scott panted, dragging himself up another flight of stairs after Captain America.

The man was already half a flight ahead of him, mid-fight with a pair of guards, but Scott didn't bother rushing to help. Two punches and a well timed-dodge later, the guards lay unconscious on the steps, and Steve was jogging up another story, not even slightly winded.

Scott stumbled up another three steps before he paused for a moment, leaning heavily on the banister to gasp for breath. God, he was out of shape.

Steve had been taking out the people sent to stop them with ease, leaving Scott in the freaking dust as he scrambled to simply _keep up_ with the man.

The Captain was a one-man army, and Scott was here for little more than moral support as he trailed in his boot-steps.

He took a moment to rest his head against the cool metal of the railing and take a few heaving breaths.

The stairs _themselves_ were beating the crap out of him, and he was pretty sure that the other man wasn't even sweating.

From around the turn in the stairwell he could hear the creak of a door opening. There were the shouts of a couple more guards, followed quickly by a few heavy thuds, and then nothing but the easy pace of Steve's boots tapping up the steps.

Scott looked up, letting his head loll back as he heard the footsteps on the stairs above him, making their way up to the next level, and forced himself to start moving again with a groan.

How in the hell was that guy even _real_?!

Oh, he was gonna need an aspirin after this...

* * *

There was nowhere for Wanda to hide.

The man didn't immediately shoot, however, and she staggered a few paces back, watching Ross closely as her powers sparked at her fingertips, trying to conjure a shield around herself. Her back hit the wall before she could go very far, and Wanda cowered back against it, the slightest hint of red coloring the air in front of her.

Nowhere near enough to deflect a bullet.

Ross stared her down unflinchingly, and despite the cloying red in the air around her, his gun didn't waver.

For a while neither of them moved as emergency lights flashed and distant sirens echoed through the halls, the man expressionless as he stared at her through the sights of his handgun, and her trying to coax enough of her powers into play to try and defend herself as her chest heaved in panic. He was blocking the hallway that she needed to get through, the one that led to the rest of the floor, and the stairs were too far to simply make a run for it. She'd be dead before she got more than a step or two.

She was trapped.

The man moved slightly and Wanda jolted in fright, her nerves wound to the point of snapping. Ross shifted his weight from one foot to the other, making a little adjustment to his grip on the gun before nodding at her.

"Hands up. Above your head."

Wanda didn't dare disobey, raising her trembling arms up on either side of her head, _hating_ how exposed the action made her feel.

"On your knees," the man ordered quietly, and Wanda sank to the ground, her hands falling to clasp behind her bowed head. Her next inhale was shaky with fright, and she blinked hard to keep the tears from welling in her eyes as she heard the man take a few slow paces toward her. She could feel the hum of her powers in the air around her, weak and wavering and sparking like embers. _Useless._

"Whatever you're doing with your powers... _stop_ ," the man ordered firmly, and Wanda sobbed in a sharp breath as she tried to claw the little wisps of scarlet back into herself.

However, her powers were reacting to her fright, and her control was flimsy at best through the drug haze. She couldn't gather them back.

Wanda went tense with terror as Ross took a sharp step closer, bringing the muzzle of the gun about a foot from her head.

"Maximoff-"

"I'm trying, _please_ ," she begged, feeling tears spill over her cheeks as she closed her eyes and ducked her head a bit further. She didn't dare try to grab the gun and wrestle it from his grip. The drugs were slowing her down, making her clumsy and weak. Such an action would only wind up with her getting shot.

"You've got three seconds."

"I'm- I'm trying! They won't-...I can't make it stop!" she sobbed, her panic burning white-hot in her chest, pulsing from her core to fuel the scarlet haze around her as she curled into herself.

"Yes, you can. Take a deep breath and _focus_ ," the man instructed bluntly.

Wanda gasped in a sharp breath, willing her powers back with all her might, acutely aware of the gun pointed at her head. It took a few jagged gulps of air for her to even her breathing out to something steady, and another few for her to refocus her attention from the gun to her powers.

Her second attempt at reeling them in was mildly more successful, and she let out a little sob of relief as the scarlet wisps began to coil back against her.

Her three seconds were long since up, but the man was still standing patiently with his gun trained on her, his body stiff with wary tension.

"Good," he muttered. "Now I want you to listen _very_ closely to what I'm about to tell you, because if you don't follow my instructions _exactly_ -"

The sound of footsteps approaching in the stairwell caused them both to tense, Ross shifting a step to the side so he had a clear line of shot. The man's eyes didn't leave her for a second, however, not even as the door burst open and Sam stepped into the hall, letting out a long curse in surprise when he spotted the two of them.

"Sam!" Wanda whimpered in fright as the general slowly turned to glance at the man.

"Get on your knees, Wilson," Ross growled, "or I'll put a bullet through her skull."

Sam looked between her and Ross, panic registering on his face for a split second before he forced his expression back to neutral and raised his hands in submission.

"All right, man. Whatever you say," Sam said slowly, lowering himself to a knee. "I'm down. See? I'm down. You can get that gun away from her."

But Ross didn't budge.

Wanda swallowed hard as Ross took a pace back, the weapon trained unerringly on her despite the man focusing on Sam. The General re-positioned himself between the two of them, too far for either to make a grab for his weapon.

There was nowhere for either of them to run. The stairwell door behind Sam opened outward, and Ross would easily be able to shoot him before he could get up and get the door open.

Wanda probably wouldn't even make it to her feet before Ross put her down like a dog.

Sam's gaze flickered from Ross to her, and the worry in his eyes did nothing for her confidence levels.

They were both well and truly trapped.

"All right," Ross said slowly, sparing a glance down the gun's sights at Wanda before turning his attention back to Sam. "Let me explain to you both how this is going to work."

"Come on, man," Sam said quietly. "You know what they're gonna do to her if you stuff her back in that cell."

Wanda saw a muscle in Ross' jaw tense.

"She doesn't deserve that," Sam murmured. "She didn't deserve any of this."

Ross gave no indication of moving, but neither did he threaten to shoot, and Wanda watched in horror as Sam slowly lowered his hands.

"Please," he whispered. "She's just a kid."

"She's dangerous," Ross replied, devoid of emotion. Like he was reading from a script.

"She's not trying to hurt anyone."

Ross gave Wanda a glance, his eyes lingering on the red haze in the air around her.

"She can't control her powers."

"It's a shield," Sam pleaded. "You've got a gun pointed at her head - she's _scared_."

"You're all wanted criminals."

"They want to _lobotomize_ her."

Ross had no argument for that, and Wanda about choked on her own heart when Sam slowly got to his feet, his hands up to either side of his head, palms out.

Ross slowly moved so he stood behind her as Sam took a step toward them, and another frightened, burning sob caught in Wanda's throat as she felt the cold press of steel against the back of her head.

"You know that what they're trying to do to her isn't regulation, General," Sam said, voice soft. "You know that it goes against every basic right a person's got, to treat 'em like that."

"Sam!" she begged as the man took a step closer.

He was going to get her killed!

Her powers began to act up again in her panic, threading around her as if trying to hide her away, and she felt Ross stiffen.

"It's okay, Wanda," Sam soothed, creeping another pace closer. "Just stay calm."

"Get back on your knees, Wilson."

"I can't do that, Sir."

"Wilson-"

"I can't just stand aside and let these hopped up loonies from the UN cut up her brain 'cause they're afraid of her." He took another slow step forward, his gaze narrowing slightly. "And I don't think you're going to, either."

Wanda jolted in terror as a gunshot went off alongside her head with a deafening crack. The ping of metal a second later accompanied a bullet casing hitting the floor by her knee.

Between Sam's feet, a neat hole was punched in the floor. A warning shot.

Wanda sobbed in a breath in terror, curling in on herself as she felt the heat from the gun barrel returning to hover at the back of her neck.

"Sam!" she cried as the man took another step toward them, his hands still held up and his gaze locked on Ross.

The man was going to kill them, didn't Sam understand that?!

"I'm not joking, Wilson," Ross growled. "Back on your knees, or she dies."

"It's okay, Wanda," Sam soothed again, daring to take another step toward them as he stared Ross down. "He's not going to hurt you."

"You so sure about that?" the General bit out from behind her.

"Pretty sure. Executing unarmed prisoners seems a bit beneath you."

Sam took another step forward, and Ross pressed the gun a bit more firmly against the back of her head.

"Last warning, Wilson."

Sam hesitated at that, uncertainty flashing in his expression.

"General..." Sam pleaded, but the other man was having none of it.

"On. Your. Knees," Ross bit out, and Wanda watched, trembling, as Sam lowered himself to the ground once more.

"Please don't do this," Sam murmured. "Throw my ass back in a cell if you want, but please, let her go."

"You've got a lot of nerve, asking me to break the law for you."

"What they want do to her is against the law, too. It's just a matter of which one you'd rather pick. I've been told that you're a good man, General," Sam pleaded, his gaze unwavering. "Please don't let me have heard wrong."

Wanda glanced up at Ross through the messy fall of her hair and swallowed hard when she saw a split second of sadness cross his face. It hardened again barely a heartbeat later, and Wanda cringed as the man turned a cool gaze on her.

"You do exactly what I tell you, and nobody gets shot. You understand?"

She nodded, the motion jerky with fright, and she went rigid as she felt the barrel of the gun prod her once more.

"On your feet, Maximoff," Ross ordered softly. "Turn around and put out your hands."

Wanda struggled to her feet, staggering a little as the drugs pulled at her brain, and turned slowly to face him with her wrists offered out, arms trembling.

It took a lot more effort than it should have not to cower back from the gun as Ross leveled it at her forehead. Wanda looked back at him in terror, feeling the weight of tears welling along her bottom lashes as she stared down her death.

Ross, however, was hesitating. His expression seemed troubled, unsure. Like he was having a fight inside his head and wasn't certain whether he was winning or losing.

After a long second the man glanced away, spitting a curse, and when he looked back up at her his gaze was practically haunted. Wanda shied back a little, her eyes locked on the barrel of the gun in fright, but to her surprise the man lowered it a fraction.

She darted her gaze up to him, meeting his stare for a long second in pleading.

Ross let out a slow breath, his eyes slipping closed and his jaw tensing as he tilted his head a touch in resignation.

When he opened his eyes again, they were soft with an emotion that she couldn't name.

"One time," the man said stiffly, slowly lowering the gun to his side. "Just this one time, I will let you walk away. _Only_ because you look like my daughter."

Wanda hardly dared to breathe.

"Now get out of here. Both of you," he said, voice rough. "Before I have to shoot you."

For a second Wanda could only stare in shock, but Sam was already scrambling to his feet, and he caught her wrist on the way by, tugging her along as he broke into a run. Wanda staggered after him as best she could, her head whirling at the sudden shift in scenery, but Sam had a firm hold of her and didn't let her fall.

When she cast a glance back over her shoulder, all she could see was General Ross standing in the middle of the hall, his gun pointed at the floor between his feet, and an expression somewhere between confusion and regret on his face as he stared into nothing.

She didn't have time to dwell on it, however, because Sam was ducking into a doorway, dragging her after him. Wanda could only follow him as he cut through a deserted room and ran through another doorway, keeping a pace that she could only just barely keep up with. A second later the man stopped up short and Wanda crashed right into his back, sending them both staggering forward a pace into what looked like the main control room.

Wanda peeked around Sam's shoulder to see what had made him stop like that and froze in fright as she saw movement from the far side of the room.

"Shit," Sam muttered as a trio of guards straightened up from whatever they were examining to shout in surprise, pointing at them. "I got these three, Wanda. Get to the jet, through the door on the left."

She opened her mouth to protest, but Sam had already caught her shoulders and given her a very pointed shove in the right direction, and Wanda obediently fled as Sam rounded on the guards with his fists up.

The three young men weren't armed. Sam could take them no problem, and she couldn't afford to be a distraction to him. As much as she hated to leave him on his own, she knew that it was safer for both of them right now if she just ran.

For a long moment, Wanda could hear the grunts and dull thud of thrown blows from behind her, overlaid by the sharp, offbeat staccato of her feet hitting the floor as she half ran, half stumbled through a second set of rooms, the awful ringing of the prison alarms increasing in volume as she got nearer to the landing bay. Whatever shot Steve had given her to wake her up was starting to wear off, and the drug haze was pulling at her mind once more, slowing her actions and thoughts.

It took her a while to realize that she was hearing two sets of footsteps.

Wanda slowed her pace a little, glancing back over her shoulder, and about choked on her heart when she saw one of the guards running after her, apparently having slipped past Sam. She turned and bolted for the hall, aware that the sound of the man following behind her was very quickly getting closer.

She couldn't outrun him.

In desperation, Wanda put all her focus into summoning her powers to her hands, staggering to a stop as she did, before whirling around to throw it at the guard with all her might.

Wanda managed to knock the man's feet out from under him, and turned to flee again before she even heard him hit the ground.

As she ran out into the hall the blaring of the alarms increased in volume, and she covered her ears with a wince as she ran. The sound was sharp and loud, feeling like it was stabbing into her head with every shrill screech. The flash of lights was not helping matters either, making her dizzy as her brain tried to process it and dilate her eyes accordingly.

On top of that, the damn drugs were still slowing her down, making her clumsy, and on already unsteady legs it was a disastrous combination. Wanda stumbled, staggering against the wall for balance as her knees buckled. For a moment she simply stood and caught her breath, gritting her teeth against the beginnings of a wicked headache as the alarms pounded in her ears.

It was as if everything here was out to cause her pain.

Wanda took a deep breath to clear her mind, her cheek pressed to the cold metal as she tried to push herself upright once more. She had to move, she could hear the guard closing in behind her.

Unfortunately she only managed to stagger back to her feet and turn around by the time the young man caught up.

She flung a hand out toward him, sending him staggering backwards in fright, but her powers arced harmlessly off her fingertips and dissipated in the air. The blaring noise from the alarms was piercing into her head like a knife, shattering her concentration.

Unfortunately, the guard seemed to realize this as well.

"Not so tough after all, are you?" he taunted in a trembling voice, edging closer to her. It was all bravado - she could see the terror shining in his eyes. "Not so tough without your magic tricks to protect you. Hard to concentrate with all the flashing lights and sirens, is it? You can't hurt me out here."

Wanda backed up another pace, trying to summon her powers to her fingers. Working her telekinesis at a distance, however, was still difficult, especially with the noise, and she couldn't seem to condense it enough to knock the man's feet out from beneath him again. If she could get close to him she could possibly grab hold of his mind, leave him dazed on the floor, but that also put her highly at risk.

Especially if her concentration broke.

She was still debating what to do when her next step back knocked her spine into the wall, and Wanda went rigid, realizing she'd been cornered. This fact wasn't lost on the guard, either.

"Gotcha," he muttered, darting a few steps closer with a fist reeled back.

He threw a punch at her and Wanda cringed back against the wall, braced for pain, but there was a sharp blur of movement and a metallic clang before the swing connected, and the next thing she knew someone was standing between her and the young man, his punch caught mid-motion in a shiny metal fist. The guard had a split second to look panicked before he was thrown into a wall, the force of the blow knocking him out.

The Winter Soldier turned to her a heartbeat later with a little grin, offering her his flesh hand.

"Figured I owed you one after that save at the airport. Good to see you, doll."

"Bucky!" she practically sobbed in relief.

"At your service."

Wanda felt a grin spreading across her face despite herself, and reached to take his hand.

He helped her back on her feet, catching an arm around her side to steady her, and began walking down the hallway to the landing bay with her in tow.

"You stopped the super soldiers?" she asked him weakly, having to raise her voice to be heard over the alarms, and Bucky nodded.

"Yeah. It's a long story, so it'll have to wait, but the world is safe. That's all that matters, right?"

She nodded again, letting the man take a bit more of her weight as her legs wobbled beneath her, threatening to give out.

"Easy there, kid," Bucky said worriedly, slowing his pace. "Don't let me rush you, you've been through a lot."

"I'm fine," she said softly. "Just want to be out of here."

"Yeah, I'll bet. Here, hold tight."

The next thing she knew the man had simply scooped her up into his arms, and she was left blinking at her surroundings dazedly as he carried her toward the jet like she weighed nothing, moving at a jog.

"Is that a different arm...?" she asked belatedly, feeling his chuckle reverberate up through his chest.

"Yeah, it is. Let's just say we have a very wealthy and powerful friend in Wakanda who felt rather guilty about trying to kill me the other week."

"No," she said questioningly, glancing up at Bucky in disbelief.

"Yep. King kitty-cat himself. We've got a safehouse there until this whole mess blows over."

"How on earth did you manage that?"

"Guilt is a very powerful motivator when put upon the head of a just man."

"I'm too drugged to untangle riddles," she protested lightly, and Bucky laughed.

"All you need to know is that he's promised us protection, and we're getting you out of this awful place," he explained gently. "We're gonna make sure these creeps never get their hands on you again."

Wanda offered the man a little smile, letting her head fall to rest against his chest as the sway of his running made her dizzy.

The hallway passed in a blur, and Wanda only really started paying attention again when the walls opened up and out, widening into an enormous hangar. Sitting in the center was a sleek black jet, the loading ramp leading up to a side door on the rather large craft.

Bucky didn't even break stride as he jogged up the ramp, only slowing once he'd ducked through the doors, moving to set her down in one of the seats.

"Sit tight, we'll be out of here soon," Bucky reassured her with a tight smile, and Wanda nodded, watching the man as he moved away to check his radio.

The seat was barely padded, but it was still better than the cold cement floor of her cell, and Wanda allowed herself a second to relax into it. She closed her eyes and let out a slow breath, trying to calm her still-pounding heart. The others would likely catch up with them soon, and Bucky was probably checking on their location now, but that didn't quell the little curl of worry that was writhing low in her belly.

They were far from being in the clear yet.

"I got the goods," a familiar voice called, and Wanda glanced up sharply as she heard footsteps echoing on the metal ramp. A second later she caught a glimpse of red hair, and let out a breath in surprised relief as a familiar face came in to view.

Natasha ducked into the jet, wearing Sam's Kevlar vest and practically falling out of it, with her arms full of gear: she had Clint's bow and quiver slipped over her shoulder, Wanda's jacket and Scott's suit folded over one arm with the Ant Man helmet in her hand, and with Sam's wings tucked under the other arm, his goggles on her head.

"Bastards were trying to take Sam's wings apart - he's gonna be pissed about that. Everything else looks like it's prettymuch in one piece, though I think they took some of Wanda's jewelry."

The assassin dumped the gear onto one of the benches, letting Bucky help her get herself untangled, before turning to Wanda with a raised eyebrow.

"Geez, you look like hell."

"Good to see you too," Wanda said, a weak little half-smile playing at her lips.

"Seriously, what the fuck have they been doing to you guys?" Natasha asked, moving over to card her fingers through Wanda's hair, pushing the messy strands back from her face as she looked her over in concern.

"Romanoff, we got incoming," Bucky muttered, leaning to peek around the doorway. Wanda blinked up at the assassin in worry, and the woman returned her gaze with a tense grin.

"Sit tight," Natasha told her, giving her shoulders a little squeeze before stepping back. "We've got this."

"The others," she protested lightly, and Bucky shot her a reassuring smile, patting the radio on his hip.

"Steve's on his way, Lang in tow. They just caught up to Barton and Wilson. We're to expect them in five minutes or less."

"You ever have Sharon get us that code for opening the top doors? We won't be going far without that," Natasha said, leaning around the corner to take a few shots into the landing bay with her Widow's bites before ducking back out of sight.

"She'll be relaying it in two minutes. Said that Van Dyne almost had her through the backup security, but there were a few unanticipated safety measures put into place since our tip off," Bucky shrugged, loading what looked like a mini cannon with a bunch of little metal balls. "We clear of friendlies?"

"Field clear."

"Perfect."

Bucky stepped into the doorway, launching the cannon's load out across the platform, and Wanda peeked out the window in time to see the little balls scatter and kick up electrical arcs between one another, forming a taser net that shocked anyone caught in the crossfire.

The sound of the electricity made her flinch, her fingers darting to her throat in a second of blind panic, but the collar didn't go off, and she forced her trembling hand back to her lap as she took a deep breath.

Scott had turned it off. She was okay.

"Ten for ten," Bucky smirked, blowing imaginary smoke from the top of the cannon as Natasha gave him a look that was half fond and half exasperated.

"Scatter shot doesn't count," she informed him dryly.

"Yeah it does."

"It's cheap."

"A kill is a kill."

"Don't give me that shit, I'm only counting it as one."

"There are ten people lying face-down out there, Romanoff, I expect credit for all ten."

"Not gonna happen, Barnes. I'm still in the lead."

"Barely."

"A lead is a lead," she mocked him with a sarcastic little shrug, but before Bucky could reply the both of them were sent ducking for cover as someone outside began shooting again, bullets clanging deafeningly off the ship.

"You missed one!" Natasha shouted to Bucky.

"He was on your watch!"

"Like hell!"

The two ducked around the doorway simultaneously, each from the opposite side, and shot out onto the landing pad.

"Mine," Natasha said before Bucky could open his mouth.

"It was not!"

"That is my Widow's bite on his chest!"

"You're blind."

The crackle of the radio on Bucky's hip silenced the two, and Barnes snatched it up.

"What's up, Steve?"

"Heading your way, gonna need some cover. Please try not to stun any of us accidentally."

"Better shot than you are," the two assassins muttered sourly at the same time, and Steve's laugh crackled through the radio as they gave one another a glare.

"Play nice, kids. We'll be there in about a minute."

"Roger, Rogers." Bucky grinned before hooking the radio back over his belt. Wanda watched the man as he loaded a hand gun with stun shot before moving toward the door of the jet, tossing a glance over his shoulder at the red-haired assassin. "I believe we're at forty-two, thirty-two?"

" _Thirty_ -two," Natasha growled, "thirty- _three_."

"You do _not_ get to count the sleeping guard."

"He wasn't asleep. If I hadn't gotten him, he would have shot you."

"Liar."

"Ingrate."

Another bullet pinged off the side of the ship, and both assassins perked.

"Mine!"

Wanda couldn't help a breathy laugh as the two crowded one another in the doorway, trying to get a shot in. She peeked out the window to see where they were shooting at and caught a glimpse of a guard behind a crate, his gun the only thing poking up over the top of the wood as he fired blindly in their direction. He was low enough behind his box to be out of the line of fire from the pair of assassins; both of their shots going over his head. However, he had all of his attention focused forward.

Wanda heaved a breath in relief as the landing bay doors burst open and Steve jogged in, Sam on his heels and Clint right behind him, Scott bringing up the exhausted rear. The Captain punched out the hiding guard on the way by, leaving the man to sprawl over the crate, unconscious.

A moment later the rest of the team were heading up the ramp.

"We got those codes yet?" Steve asked as he ducked onto the jet, throwing a grin at her as the others followed on his tail.

"Waiting to hear from Sharon," Bucky relayed. "Should be any minute now."

"Wanda," Clint breathed in relief, slipping past Steve and crossing to her side to grab her close in a hug. "Jesus, kid, you scared me half to death. Where were you?"

"You sent me to the wrong floor," she accused gently, the corner of her mouth quirked in a weak attempt at humor, and the man hung his head with a sigh.

"Yeah...I'm an idiot. Are you okay?"

"I'll be better once we're out of here."

"That's my girl," he chuckled, mussing up her hair affectionately. "Sit tight, I have people to snipe."

The radio at Bucky's hip hissed with static, giving a little click before a feminine voice came on.

"Steve, you there?"

"Yeah, we're all here," Bucky responded. "You have that code for us?"

"Just about, but you need someone to punch it in at the control booth - I can't access it remotely."

"You got my wings back? I got that covered," Sam grinned, beginning to dig through their recovered gear for his jet pack.

"You've got _half_ your wings back," Natasha corrected him. "They were in the middle of scrapping them when I got there."

"Sonofabitch..." he sighed, holding the machinery up with a frown.

"They might still glide?" she offered, and Sam sent her a little pout.

"I guess I'll make due," he said, shrugging the harness over his shoulders. "You find Redwing?"

"Got left back at Leipzig. Stark's got it."

"Fucking hell."

"I'll steal it back for your birthday," she promised with a wink as she helped him fasten himself into the wings.

"Thank you. We would both appreciate it. Last thing I need is Tony fiddling with Redwing...he'll probably add cup-holders or something dumb like that and call it an upgrade..."

Natasha snorted a little in amusement, hauling a strap tight as Sam fiddled with one of the controls on the jet pack.

"Good to go," she reassured him, clapping a hand on his shoulder before stepping back.

"Radio," Bucky offered, holding out his device to Sam, and the man was quick to clip it onto his belt.

"Am I clear?" Sam asked, shifting his weight from foot to foot in a little hopping motion as he prepared to run.

"If you're quick," Clint muttered, sighting along the shaft of an arrow. "You've got about thirty seconds. Starting..."

The arrow left his hand with a hiss, and a second later a concussive blast sent a shockwave across the room.

"Now."

Sam was out the door in a flash, leaping over boxes like they weren't even there as he bolted for the control tower and scrambled up the short ladder like a squirrel.

Steve watched him for a long second, making sure that the man got to his destination safely before adjusting the channel on his radio and pressing the button down.

"Sharon, you guys have those codes for us?"

"Almost through," was the crackling reply. "They caught us trying to hack in - apparently the prison alarms also alerts site security - and they've been throwing more firewalls at us. They're not hard, they're just...time consuming."

"Estimate?" Steve asked, glancing out over the landing platform as Clint took out another cluster of guards.

"About ten more seconds," a second voice called through the line, and Scott let out a happy squeak. "As long as I can beat their I.T. guy's next lock-out attempt...HA! Got it! I'm in!"

"Get ready to punch these in," Sharon ordered, and Steve waved at Sam in the control booth, getting the other man's thumbs-up to show that he was listening.

"All right, we're good."

"Eight. Five. Seven. One. Six. Six. Four. Zero. Three. One. Zero. Six. Two. Seven. Nine. Zero to open, then star to lock."

A grating creak from overhead marked the code's success, and Clint let out a whoop, turning to high-five Scott as sunlight began to stream in from the slowly opening doors above. The archer whirled around and shot another concussive arrow out onto the landing pad, knocking the few approaching guards down so that Sam could glide back to the ship safely, before ducking back out of the doorway to give the man room to land.

"Thanks, Sharon. I owe you one. Again," Steve grinned as Sam touched down safely.

"Love you, Hope!" Scott called before Steve released his hold on the talk button, and a quiet laugh came from whoever was on the other line with Sharon.

"Still gonna kick your ass for getting arrested again, Lang. Love you."

"Call me when you all arrive," Sharon demanded, and then the line went dead.

"Brace yourselves, ladies and gentlemen," Steve ordered. "We're taking off the second those doors are all the way open."

"Um...better make that quick," Natasha muttered, peeking out of the jet again. "We got company."

"How many?" Bucky asked, groping for his stun cannon.

"Five now, more behind them. Likely to be more after that, one is sounding the al-"

The rest of her sentence was cut off by a screeching siren wail, warning lights beginning to flash in the hangar bay, and Wanda hissed in pain as she covered her ears.

"Someone shut that up!" Clint called, a hand over one ear and the other ear pressed to his shoulder as he reached for Wanda, drawing her close as if to shield her from the noise.

"Aim for the control box on the wall," Scott shouted. "That should fry their whole PA system."

"Got it," Natasha muttered, her expression steely as she moved to the doorway. Two bullet shots later, the sound cut off, and everyone heaved a breath in relief. No sooner had Scott opened his mouth to make a smart comment, however, when another round of gunfire pinged off the side of their jet and sent everyone ducking for cover.

"Who's got stun shot?" Steve asked, glancing around as everyone checked their weapons.

"Got about three," Sam muttered, checking his belt.

"Crap...I'm down to lethals," Clint muttered, thumbing through his arrows.

"Widows bites are running low, too," Natasha reported.

Wanda glanced down at her palms as the others relayed similar information, twitching her fingers slightly as she summoned a few crimson sparks to dart across her skin.

Taking a deep breath, she poured her focus into bringing her powers to the surface, watching them seep up from her hands like smoke.

She could help.

She could do this.

"Steve, they're getting closer," Natasha cautioned. "I really don't like going into gunfights when I'm just throwing punches."

"Sam, take out the nearest ones. Scott, check that box in the back for additional ammo," Steve ordered. "We're gonna have to play this carefully."

Wanda took a slow breath, gathering her nerve as she clenched her hands into fists around the wisps of red, snuffing them out. The others quieted as she slowly got to her feet, turning to face them.

"I can block them," Wanda offered, glancing up to meet Steve's gaze.

Before the Captain could reply, however, she felt a hand come to rest on her shoulder.

"You sure, kid?" Clint asked. "Don't strain yourself trying anything if you're still all drugged to hell..."

"I think I've got this," she said softly. "Just give me a moment."

The sharp ping of bullets on metal continued to echo through their little jet, and Wanda frowned down at her hands, willing her powers to come back to the surface as she took long, slow breaths. The drugs were still there, but now they were more of a nuisance than a crippling effect. It was hard, but her focus was finally kicking in. She could concentrate through them.

The red wisps that darted between her fingers began to condense and take shape this time, and Wanda stepped closer to the door as she finally managed to coax her magic up to full power.

One of the guards was standing at the edge of the landing pad, emptying round after round into the side of their jet, and with a firm flick of her wrist she tore the gun from his hands and sent it flying. A wave of her hand pushed him back, scarlet blooming on his chest as her powers carried out her will, and she shoved him into a group of his buddies that were hiding behind a crate, disorienting them all for a long few seconds.

The next sweep of her hand knocked over some boxes and stacked equipment, sending the guards that had been using that as cover scrambling for a new hiding spot. Another wave of her hands had the doors to the lower levels of the prison warping on their hinges, preventing anyone else from entering the launch pad area.

"We're just over three quarters open," Bucky called from the front. "We'll be lifting off soon."

Wanda swept a small cluster of guards off their feet, sending them scampering for cover as they cried out in fear, and she leaned back against the doorway to catch her breath for a second as they all tried to collect themselves for another rush.

"Wanda, on your right," Sam warned sharply, and she whirled to see a man setting up a rocket launcher, aimed directly at their jet. She took a deep breath, closing her eyes and calling her powers to her hands with all her might.

Even behind her eyelids, she could see the brilliant flare of scarlet that bloomed in her palm.

She grabbed the machine away from the guard, hoisting it into the air carefully, and glanced up to see that the doors above them were almost completely open, showing a crystal blue sky.

With a flick of her wrist, she sent the machine spiraling up out of the prison and into the ocean, tossing the man backwards into his companions a second later.

Her powers were coming back to her more easily now, especially with the fresh air to clear her head and the sirens no longer pounding in her ears, and Wanda swept a hand over the landing pad, knocking all the guards off their feet as they tried to make one final rush for them.

A few bullets ricocheted off the side of the jet, and with another wave of her hand, Wanda had walled off the landing pad with a force field.

" _Hell_ yeah!" Scott cheered, and she allowed herself a smile as the man made a face and a few rude gestures at the guards from behind the safety of her shield.

"We can fit! Takeoff in three," Bucky called, and Clint stepped close to secure an arm around Wanda's middle, letting her work her powers as he braced them both to make sure she didn't fall.

"Two..."

Scott turned to go to a seat, patting his backside at the guards before moving away from the door, and Natasha hid a smirk behind her hand.

"One," Bucky called, followed by Steve ordering everyone to hold on tight, and then the wind kicked up. Wanda squinted as her hair was tossed about her head, whipping into her face and eyes.

"Liftoff!"

Wanda let her force field fall as they took off, dragging the door of the craft shut with a wave of her hand, and the jet rose in a whir of engines, propelling them clear of the prison walls.

Bucky took exactly two seconds to turn them in the right direction, and then they were rocketing off as fast as the engines would carry them.

Through the window, Wanda could see the dark blob of the Raft quickly vanishing in the background, leaving nothing but miles and miles of open ocean in their wake.

Finally, they were free.

* * *

 **Author's Note:** If you like this story, and you're in the Breath of the Wild fandom, go check out the story I'm editing/co-authoring with ZeroTech: "Calamity Link." (AKA, the other writing project that's been taking over my life.)

About two more chapters of this to go. Please drop me a review! I love hearing from you all!


	15. Chapter 15

Wanda had only a moment to gather herself, to register the fact that she was free, truly _free_ of that place, before she was surrounded.

Clint swept her into a bear hug, and she laughed weakly, hugging him back, as Steve came up behind her. The super soldier swept her up in a hug of his own the second Clint set her down, and she only realized she was shaking when he set her on her feet once more and she felt Clint catch her shoulders to steady her. Scott sort of awkwardly stood in front of her, his arms hesitating somewhere between a handshake and a high-five, before she stepped in close and gave him a hug as well.

She turned to Sam as the others all laughed and clapped one another on the back, stepping into the man's open arms and letting her head rest on his shoulder.

She felt her throat tighten a little with emotion as Sam's arms settled around her.

He had offered to let himself get locked back up in that underwater hell so long as it meant that she got to go free.

"Thank you," she breathed against his ear, and felt him nod.

"Anything for you, Wanda," he said, flashing her a little smile as he drew back.

Wanda turned to find herself quickly scooped into Natasha's arms, the assassin cuddling her close in a near uncharacteristic show of affection. Wanda cautiously let herself relax into Natasha's embrace, feeling an unspoken apology for the fight passing between them as they melted right back into comfortable familiarity as if they'd never been at odds. Her mentor took a half-step back to look her over, and the redhead's lips quickly tugged into a frown when her gaze landed on Wanda's throat.

"Can we get this stupid thing off of her?" Natasha called to the others, a finger hooked around the shock collar in disgust, and Steve broke away from the group to go dig a little tool box out from under one of the seats.

"Sure thing. Probably have bolt cutters in here somewhere..."

Wanda took a moment while he was busy to look around at her team.

They were here. They were all here. They'd come _back_.

And she and Sam and Clint and Scott had all been freed from that awful prison.

A giddy little laugh escaped her lips at that, and Clint shot her a smile.

"God, it's good to hear you laugh again," he grinned. "I was starting to get worried."

"Bingo!" a voice called before she could reply, and Wanda glanced up as Steve held up a pair of bolt cutters in victory, turning to her with a huge grin.

"Sit," Natasha instructed, placing a hand on her shoulder and adding a little pressure, directing Wanda onto the bench once more. "I'm going to go check on our pilot."

Natasha turned to walk away, and Wanda turned her gaze to Steve as the man settled himself beside her, the large pair of bolt cutters held carefully in his grip.

"Just stay still a bit longer, we'll have you out of this damn thing in no time," the Captain said, his grin turning into a frown when Natasha shouted "language" cheerfully from up by the cockpit.

"Oh, come on, guys, I thought we agreed to drop that..." he groaned.

Wanda felt a little smile spread across her face for the first time in what felt like days.

The Captain shook his head as Natasha winked at him, turning his attention back to Wanda with a long sigh as he muttered to himself.

"You make one comment, one time..."

Steve gently brushed her hair out of the way, tilting her head to the side so he could get the bolt cutters up near the collar.

"Scott, you're sure this is deactivated?" he asked, and the other man nodded.

"Checked the wires myself. They should all be disconnected."

Steve turned his attention back to her with a raised eyebrow.

"You ready?"

Wanda gave a little nod, gritting her teeth in anticipation.

With a piercing screech of metal giving way and a heavy clunk, Wanda felt the collar jostle against her neck as the bolt cutters severed it. Steve was prying it open a second later, and Wanda took a deep breath as her powers pulsed red-hot through her blood.

Freedom.

Steve was looking down at the collar in mild question, and Wanda felt a little flare of irrational anger as her eyes scanned over the awful device for the first time. When he noticed her staring, Steve offered the collar out to her with a raised eyebrow, but Wanda just recoiled a little.

"Destroy it," she said, her tone flat and hard. "I never want to see it again."

The Captain's eyes softened with sympathy, and with a metallic screech and a flex of rather impressive biceps, the man had bent the collar into itself, repeating the action until all that remained was a matted ball of metal and fraying wires.

"You want a shot at it with your powers?" he asked, packing the remains a bit more tightly, and Wanda hummed out a little amused sound in reply.

"Maybe when we land. I don't trust my emotions to take such a task at a small scale right now."

The man nodded, stuffing the scraps out of sight in a pocket and taking a step so that he stood in front of her. Wanda stood to face him and Steve drew her close, his fingers weaving through her hair to cradle her head to his shoulder.

"I am _never_ gonna let that happen to you again, I promise," Steve murmured against her temple.

"I trust you," Wanda whispered in reply, knowing that there was really very little he could do to keep that vow but appreciating the words and sentiment nonetheless.

The Captain hugged her tight for another long few seconds before letting her go, and Wanda took a slow breath to get her emotions back under control as they swelled up with affection.

She was still feeling a bit woozy from the drugs, so when Steve suggested that she sit back and recover for a bit, she didn't argue.

Once the Captain had moved away, the seat beside her was taken over by another familiar face.

"Hey, kiddo, how you feeling?" Clint asked, lowering himself down at her side and slinging an arm around her shoulders in a partial hug.

"A lot better now."

"Good, that's...that's good," he said, his eyes tracing over her, lingering on the dark shadows beneath her eyes and the redness around her throat where the electricity had almost burned her. "Hey, where'd you get the sweater?" Clint asked, pointedly changing the subject as he cleared his throat and blinked hard.

"Vizh came to see me while I was in solitary. He brought it for me."

"That was nice of him. At least you got to see one familiar face while you were down there," he muttered, tightening his one-armed hug around her. "God, I hate that you had to go through that...I should have just left you back on the farm with Laura."

"Don't be silly," she scolded lightly. "You were up against super soldiers and you needed help. If I hadn't come, Steve and Bucky may not have made it to the jet to escape."

"I still shouldn't have let them take you prisoner with the rest of us."

"You couldn't have known."

But Clint was shaking his head.

"You're wrong, kiddo. I should have seen it coming a mile away."

Wanda tilted her head slightly in question as Clint looked down at his feet with a sigh.

"I've worked with governments before. Specifically when it came to people who have been enhanced," he started, his brows drawn in a little frown. "People are always going to be afraid of what they can't understand. Which means there's a bunch of damn idiots out there that will only ever see you as a threat, no matter how much good you do. And I'd like to say I can protect you from them, but clearly I can't. Hell," he said with a bitter little laugh. "I couldn't even get you out of the compound without half my plan relying on you taking over once I got my ass handed to me."

"Clint..."

"After Sokovia, I swore to myself that I'd never let anything bad happen to you," he admitted with a shrug. "I couldn't save your brother, so I figured if I could at least keep you safe..."

Wanda swallowed hard, the sudden mention of her twin twisting like something sharp in her chest.

Clint let out a slow breath, leaning forward over his knees with his hands folded together, staring off into the distance for a long moment before he glanced back up at her.

"I just want to lock you away somewhere, so that no one will ever touch you again," he shrugged. "But how would that be any better than Tony locking you up at the compound? Or the UN sealing you away at the Raft?" He shook his head. "The only way I can keep you safe is to keep your prisoner. And I'm never gonna do that to you."

Wanda reached out slowly, threading her fingers through his, and forced a little smile as he met her gaze.

"I would not go back and do things differently, even knowing that I would wind up at the Raft," she reassured him. "Like you told me before...it's my job."

"You know, I couldn't be any prouder of you if you were my own kid," Clint said in reply, a strained little grin on his lips and his eyes glassy as he looked her over. Wanda returned the smile, and the man gave her shoulder a gentle squeeze before getting to his feet. "You should try to rest. I'll be back in a bit - the one-armed wonder is currently sitting in my pilot's seat."

Wanda bit back a soft laugh as he pressed a little kiss to the top of her head before letting her go, making his way to the front of the plane.

Once he was out of view, she looked around.

The others were all scattered about the jet, reading or napping or looking out the window as they daydreamed. Steve was up near the cockpit, his nose buried in some schematic.

With a little huff of breath, Wanda pushed herself to her feet and crossed to stand before him.

She could hear the ending mutters of an argument from up front, and was just in time to duck out of the way as Bucky marched into the back of the plane, pouting as he muttered to himself about "just because you're named after a bird doesn't mean you can fly better than me..." before throwing himself into an empty seat near Sam.

Steve smiled after the man for a long second before turning his attention to her, his expression softening a bit.

"Wanda," he smiled, warm and welcoming. "What can I do for you?"

"I wanted to thank you again," she murmured, shuffling a foot. "For coming back."

"Of course I came back," Steve's expression gentled a touch, "I couldn't leave my best girl locked up."

Wanda took a deep breath, looking up at the ceiling to blink back tears as her emotions tried to take over. When she managed to compose herself she found Steve watching her with the same gentle smile, concern still in his eyes.

She wanted to cry at the thought that someone had cared enough about them to risk a prison break, but they had all been rescued, they were all safe now, and that was something to be happy about, so instead she forced a smile.

"I thought your best girl was Sharon," Wanda teased weakly, and she was rewarded with a pair of loud cat-calls from Sam and Bucky as Steve sank down in his chair, face slowly reddening.

The sight brought a real smile to her lips, and blinking away the tears got easier.

"Shall I take that as a 'yes'?" she asked.

"You missed it, Wanda, he got a kiss and everything," Sam laughed.

"Yeah, although the poor girl had to practically grab him by the collar to get it," Bucky scoffed.

"I will personally hand the pair of you over to Tony if you breathe another word about that," Steve threatened weakly, hiding his face in a hand. The two in the back simply replied by pursing their lips and making smooching noises.

"Finally decide to take my advice, then?" Natasha asked, throwing him a knowing smirk that Steve returned with a glare.

"Thought you lot were supposed to be on my side."

"Oh, we are," Natasha nodded, her expression serious. "We fully support your budding relationship, and will be sure to take every opportunity to tease you about it, as any good friends would."

"I didn't tease you about _your_ relationship," Steve protested.

"I don't operate under playground rules," she replied with a wicked grin. "Just cause you took the high road doesn't mean the rest of us are going to."

"So when do we get to meet the lucky girl? Should we be looking to set up chaperones?" Scott asked, and was rewarded with Steve tossing a crumpled up piece of paper at him.

"I'll say right now that I'm not giving him the sex talk. We don't know each other that well," Sam said, raising his hands and shooting a grin at Bucky when the other super soldier made a face.

"Why _me_?"

"You've known him for like, _ever._ "

"Is this where I insert a comment about Steve being a ninety-year-old virgin?" Clint called from the front.

"That is _not_ true!" Steve hollered back.

"Sorry, my bad. Eighty nine," was the flippant reply, and Steve growled a little under his breath.

"Clint-"

Wanda laughed brightly, her heart soaring with the warmth and familiarity of her friend's banter as she dropped into a seat beside Steve. The soldier turned to her with a long-suffering look as Bucky whispered something to Sam and the two erupted into laughter.

"You have anything to add to the discussion?" Steve asked her rather dryly.

"I think you two are very cute together," Wanda told him with a smile.

The way Steve 's mouth slowly pulled up into a smirk following her comment, however, told her that she'd just invited herself into the receiving end of their teasing. She tilted her head in question as Steve righted himself in his chair, leaning forward to address her with an "innocent" little smile that was just a touch too wide to be genuine.

"You know...I _could_ say the same thing about you and Vision," he started, and Wanda looked away quickly as she felt her face heat up. Steve laughed at her reaction, and she snatched one of the magazines up, flipping it to a random page to bury her nose in. "Oh, is that a blush? I think it is," he teased.

"S-shut up."

"He did come to visit her when we were in lockup," Sam pointed out, trying to catch her eye.

"Twice, if I'm not mistaken," Clint called from up front. The traitor.

"He was...checking in on me, is all," she said, folding the magazine closed. The boys nodded and winked at one another, grinning, and Wanda drew herself up with as much indignation as she could muster. "He was just being friendly!"

"Only to you," Sam grinned. "He didn't come visit me."

"Or being me a sweater," Clint called.

"And he certainly wasn't pulling his punches for anyone else at the airport," Natasha added with a smirk.

"Aww, and they'd be so cute together," Scott smiled.

"Oh my _God_ you are all insufferable," Wanda muttered, burying her face in her hands. With a laugh, Sam stood and crossed to her, tossing an arm about her shoulders companionably.

"Look, Wanda, if you ever need advice on boys," Sam started, his face all seriousness when she glanced up between her fingers with a raised eyebrow. "Do _not_ ask me. Or Steve. Or Natasha. Or any of us, really, we're all terrible with relationships."

"I have a wife and kids, thank you," Clint called from the front.

"Excepting Barton. Go to him for advice."

"I hate _all_ of you," Wanda muttered into her hands, her face flushed so hot that she could feel it.

"Love you too, kiddo," Steve grinned, reaching to clap her gently on the shoulder.

"Hey, do you think they'll let me go through the drive-through in this thing?" Clint called back to them before anyone else could speak. "I think I see a McDonalds on the GPS, and after their crappy excuse for prison food, I'm dying for a chocolate shake."

Instead of a reply, he got a chorus of orders shouted from the back, and Wanda smiled as Bucky asked Steve who this "McDonald" was, and if he was on their side.

As Natasha tried to convince Bucky that McDonald was an Irish SHIELD agent with a red, white and yellow mech suit like Stark's, Wanda looked around with a smile.

They were all standing around, laughing and joking despite the bruises and scrapes and prison uniforms, teasing one another like there had never been a fight at all, and it sent a warm feeling curling up through her chest. A warmth that she hadn't really felt since losing Pietro.

It was familiarity, and trust, and love.

It was family.

It was a strange family, to be sure, but they were hers now. And they would all protect each other.

As long as they had each other, she knew that everything would be okay.

* * *

Vision stood in front of the empty cell, staring in through the glass as if focusing hard enough would make Wanda reappear.

Not that he ever wanted to see her back in that wretched place, but at least then he would know where she _was_...that she wasn't injured or dead or worse...

He'd had no reply to his email, nor had he really expected one - it was far too risky to make such things a two-way conversation - but that left him completely in the dark as to what had happened.

Had Captain Rogers managed to get them out? Had they all escaped? Were any of them injured from the attempt?

Or, the possibility that he didn't want to think about...

Had it failed?

Had they all gotten arrested and simply been transferred to another prison?

Or had the UN chosen that as the final straw and executed them all?

Feeling chilled to the core, Vision tore his eyes away from the awful little cell and let himself phase through the metal plating of the Raft, up toward the landing bay.

The top of the prison was still raised above the water level with the hatch open, the sky shining bright above the platform where there were soldiers running around in a panic like ants whose nest had just been stepped on.

Something had clearly gone down here...something _huge._

Vision stuck to the shadows, not letting his presence be known as he watched the men scurry about, shouting to one another and pointing. Scattered across the cold concrete, he could see the bullet casings from the guards' standard-issue weapons, as well as the used rounds of the non-lethal stun shot that both Natasha and Clint normally carried.

There had been a fight.

His sharp eyes could pick up a few small splatters of blood around the landing bay, but they weren't large enough to be from anything more than shallow flesh wounds.

Here, at least, he could hope that the lingering evidence proved an escape. Or, at the very least, that his teammates were unharmed.

Although Wanda's shock collar was technically considered "not harming her" he remembered with a scowl, and Vision had to take a long few moments to settle the hot, tense feeling in his chest that he was starting to associate with the emotion "rage" before returning to his observation.

Most of the debris had been cleared away, as had most of the other things where he might find a clue as to what had happened, or where the others had gone. The security feeds had been pulled and spirited off to some office in the UN for evaluation, the cells stripped of anything that the prisoners might have left as a clue, and even the intake records for the ex-Avengers had mysteriously vanished from the classified files room, as if they'd never been here at all.

But then, corruption did so _hate_ the light...

Vision observed for only a moment more before drawing back into himself. There was honestly very little that he could do here aside from look for any tiny, remaining clues that the others may have left for him, although leaving any kind of hint - no matter how encrypted - would be a risk that Captain Rogers was not likely to take with the safety of his imprisoned teammates on the line and help outside of himself unlikely to show up.

Vision let out a long breath in tired irritation, not quite sure who he'd picked _that_ particular habit up from, and he shook his head to clear it.

There was nothing more for him to find at the Raft.

Vision took one final glance around before phasing through the ceiling panels of the prison and rocketing away like lightning, his thoughts in a whirl.

There was much left still for him to do. He needed to try to amend the Accords, so Wanda and the rest of the team could come back. He needed to make sure that none of this had gotten traced back to him. He needed to check in on Rhody while the man was struggling through physical therapy...but that could all wait.

For now...

For now he had to find Wanda.

* * *

 **Author's Note:** Stay tuned, I've got one more piece of this story to go! (Sorry for taking forever and a half with updates. Life is being a pain. =_=")


	16. EPILOGUE

"Hey, Wanda?"

Wanda looked up from her book as Steve poked his head through the door, a barely-hidden grin on his face as he stepped halfway into her room.

"Someone's here to see you," he said, nodding back out toward the hall.

Wanda sat up, feeling her brows pinch in confusion.

Who could possibly want to see her? Was it the doctors again? It seemed a little soon...

They had been in Wakanda for a couple weeks now, staying at the palace under King T'Challa's hospitality.

The recently freed prisoners had been rather wary of their "host" at first, but when the man had greeted Bucky and Steve as he would old friends - and Bucky had seemed genuinely happy to see him - they had thrown that caution to the wind. If Bucky was willing to trust T'Challa after the king had spent the better portion of a week trying to kill him, the rest of them figured they had no grounds to question.

They'd all been moved into the east wing of the palace that very evening.

The Wakandan palace was beautiful, an elegant combination of traditional castle opulence and modern architecture, but outside of a few hallways, Wanda hadn't seen much more of it than her room.

After they had landed and gotten settled in, the King had expressed concern about her treatment at the Raft, and had talked her into letting some of his doctors look her over for any possible damage that the shock collar, drugs, or general stress could have caused. The results so far had been promising, but she'd been ordered to take it easy until they were sure.

The doctors had told her that she should be fine if she wanted to wander the palace grounds or go explore the city, so long as she paced herself.

Wanda had told everyone else that she'd been strictly instructed to remain inside.

Honestly, she was still a little nervous about being in Wakanda...about staying in the country of the people she'd killed in Lagos.

Her face had been plastered all over the news, after all. There was no way that they wouldn't see her and _know_ that she was the one who had murdered eleven of their own.

No way that they wouldn't want revenge.

T'Challa had assured her that it was water under the bridge - an honest accident where the blame had been unfairly shifted to the one trying to contain the bomb instead of the one who set it off - but Wanda still knew better than to push her luck.

Aside from her teammates and a few of T'Challa's doctors, she'd had very limited contact with anyone else in Wakanda. She wasn't sure if it was guilt or fear that kept her from wandering beyond the east wing, but she'd hardly set foot outside of her bedroom since they'd arrived, save for group meals with the others and the occasional doctor's checkup or "team meeting" in the little conservatory that they all used as a common area.

If the others thought it strange, they'd yet to mention anything, although she'd definitely noticed that Clint and Natasha seemed to be going out of their way to try and coax her out and about.

Perhaps her "visitor" was Clint trying to talk her into a walk through the gardens again.

But something wasn't right. If it had been one of them that was wanting to see her, why wouldn't Steve have simply said so?

She swallowed hard, glancing down at her book as she took a slow breath to steady her voice before speaking.

"To see me?" she asked Steve, placing her marker in between the pages and slowly closing the novel over as something small and cold and _worried_ curled in her belly. Steve, however, was grinning like he knew some big secret that she didn't, and his smile only got bigger as she tilted her head suspiciously.

"Yeah. Demanded it, actually," the super-soldier shrugged, leaning back against the door frame in a pointedly casual move. "Phased right through the conservatory room wall and-"

But Wanda didn't hear the rest, already on her feet in a jolt of adrenaline, squeezing past Steve in the doorway a second later and heading for the conservatory at a dead run.

There was only one person she knew who could phase through walls.

The elaborate hallways of the palace passed her in a blur, rich tapestries and priceless carvings a vague background as the sharp click of her boot heels echoed loudly off the polished marble.

Right. Left. Another left at the grand hall. Right. Down to the end of the hall. Left. Third room down.

The door to the conservatory was already open, sunlight streaming from the windows out into the hall in a splash of yellow. Wanda skidded to a stop at the doorway with her heart caught hard in her throat, gasping for breath as she glanced into the room, and for a long second she just _stared_.

He was here.

Vision was _here_.

And for once, she wasn't dreaming.

The synth was standing on the far side of the room, his hands folded behind his back as he stared out the floor-to-ceiling windows into the Wakandan jungle, wearing a dress shirt and sweater vest that seemed overly formal when compared to the tank tops and shorts the rest of the Avengers had taken to wearing to escape the heat.

He had something cradled carefully in his hands that she couldn't quite make out, and there was a suitcase sitting on the ground nearby, bulging a little at the zipper with whatever he'd stuffed in it.

It was a little surreal, so find him standing here of all places.

"Vision?" she whispered.

He looked up, his troubled expression replaced with a smile the second their eyes met.

"Wanda," he breathed.

She ran over to him in a heartbeat and he swept her into his arms, crushing her to his chest. Wanda hugged him back and cinched her grip tight, taking a deep breath of the warm, crisp scent that was so uniquely _him_ as she let her eyes flutter closed.

"Vizh... _Vizh_..."

"Thank goodness you are unharmed. I feared that I was too late..."

"Oh, Vision, I've missed you so much!"

"I have missed you as well, Wanda," he murmured, and she felt her throat tighten a little with tears as he nuzzled his face gently into her hair. "I am so glad that you were not harmed in the escape."

Wanda froze at that, blinking hard.

It was the logical assumption to make, of course - that their removal from the prison was an escape - but the way he'd said it seemed almost familiar. As if he'd known what had happened, or what was _going_ to happen, in order for him to be worried about it.

And the only way Vision would have known about something that secretive before it had happened...

"You sent Steve to find us," she whispered in dawning realization. "You helped him get us out!"

"I realize that it is technically a breach of the Accords," Vision admitted slowly, "and that should I ever be discovered, I would be facing severe punishment for assisting your escape, however...I simply cannot bring myself to feel remorse over it."

Wanda could feel the enormous smile that was working its way across her lips, and she pressed herself close once more, cinching her grip tight around his waist.

"I knew you wouldn't leave me," she whispered against his chest.

"Never," he promised.

Wanda took a slow breath to press back her emotions, scrambling for something to say.

"What are you doing _here_?" she breathed after a long few seconds.

"I came to see you," Vision replied, shrugging as if it was the most obvious thing in the world. "To make sure that you were all right."

Wanda shook her head in amazement, but felt something cold prickling at the base of her conscious.

Vision had found them in Wakanda.

It must have taken hours of searching to be able to track them down.

An unwelcome thrill of panic ran through her at that, and she stepped back out of his arms before he could ask her what was wrong, nerves twisting sharp in her stomach. "You won't tell anyone, will you? You won't tell anyone where we are?"

Her panic was bubbling to the surface as thoughts of the Raft flashed through her head, the memory of the collar etched on her throat like a vice grip, choking her breath away. She couldn't go back there. She would rather die than spend her life locked up like that.

Vision blinked at her for a second before reaching one hand out slowly to cup her face. Wanda leaned into his touch as he brushed his thumb over her cheek, the man gently easing the worried frown from her face.

"I have no wish to see you locked up ever again. The only one who knows your location is myself, and that is how it will stay. No one in the UN needs to know that I've been here. I have not even informed Mr. Stark as to where exactly I have gone."

The relief was palpable, washing over her and turning her muscles weak.

Wanda let out a shuddering breath, smiling as she stepped into his embrace and hugged him tight once more, burying her face against his shoulder.

"Oh Vizh...I've missed you so much..."

"And I you."

When she drew back this time, she took a moment to look him over more thoroughly.

He was wearing the same sweater that she'd said he looked good in almost three months ago - the dork hardly ever changed his appearance to anything else - and had a little black suitcase sitting on the ground hardly a pace away.

It took her another moment to realize that while one of Vision's hands was resting open-palmed against her side, the other was fisted, and she drew his wrist into her hold in curiosity to look at whatever it was he was holding.

Vision opened his hand obligingly, revealing what looked like crumpled plant matter scattered across his red palm.

"What is this?" she asked, tilting her head as she examined the crushed petals.

"Ah. It is a flower. For you. I made sure that it was not toxic before harvesting it."

"How sweet, thank you," she smiled, cupping her hands to catch the loose petals as he tried to hand it to her. "You have a bag with you...are you staying?" she asked.

"It is yours," Vision corrected her.

"Mine...?"

"I...erm. I brought some of your things, as well. From the compound. It's nothing much, I'm afraid," he admitted, looking flustered. "A few changes of clothing, some personal items, pictures, your iPod and laptop..." He glanced up, awaiting her reaction nervously, and Wanda gave him a gentle smile.

"It's more than I could have hoped for. Thank you."

The synthetic man smiled back at her, his white teeth a sharp contrast to his dark skin, and Wanda felt her own smile trying to spread into a stupid grin as her cheeks got warm.

She opened her mouth to speak, but another voice cut in before she could.

"I don't suppose you brought anything for the rest of us?"

The two looked up to find Natasha leaning against the doorway, her arms crossed and a sly grin on her face.

"I...well...I'm afraid I only thought to pack for Wanda..." Vision began sheepishly, but Natasha waved the start of his apology away with a smile.

"Sounds like an excuse to drag the boys out shopping. Clint needed a wardrobe update anyway."

"Excuse you, _my_ wardrobe is fine."

Clint's reply came from the couch, and both Wanda and Vision startled a bit, whirling to look for him. The archer was lying flat on his back across the length of the sofa, playing with a dart from the dart board. He merely raised an eyebrow at Wanda when she mouthed 'how long...?' in shock.

"You have exactly one set of clothing," Natasha said from the doorway, her tone deadpan.

"One is plenty."

"Wearing the same underwear for two or more days in a row is frowned upon. Also you wander around nude when you wash them."

"I do not! I have a sheet!" Barton said indignantly.

"You also need new sheets."

"You just want to drag me out shopping to torture me."

"Have to get you back for that right hook somehow," she shrugged. "Left a bruise."

"Don't even start comparing bruises, have you seen my back?"

"Yes, actually. Every time you do laundry. And most of your naked ass as well."

Wanda bit her lip, trying not to giggle as Barton groaned and Vision looked between the two curiously.

"Fine, fine. Shopping it is," Clint said with a huff, tossing the dart away carelessly. It landed dead-center on the target board.

Natasha smirked, straightening up and turning to leave the room.

"Come on then, papa bear. I think the lovebirds can do fine without a chaperone."

Clint grumbled out something that sounded like a complaint, but stood to obediently follow Natasha out of the room. He reached to ruffle Wanda's hair on his way by, and she ducked out from beneath his hand with a soft laugh. The archer smiled tightly as he leaned close, nodding at Vision.

"If he gives you any trouble, put him through the floor again," he muttered, and Wanda had to duck her head to hide her smile.

"Come on, Clint. She's got this covered," Natasha called with a smile. "Behave, kids."

Wanda shook her head at the two assassins, trying and failing to bite back her smile.

When she turned around Vision was looking down at her, a soft adoration in his eyes that warmed her to the core and set something fluttering in her stomach.

"Come on, Vizh," Wanda smiled back up at him, "you can help me put my things away. I'll show you to my room."

"Door stays open!" Barton called from somewhere down the hallway, and Wanda felt her face flush hot as Vision blinked in confusion.

"Why would the door need to stay open?" he asked.

"I...will explain it to you some other time," Wanda said sheepishly. "Come."

She turned to lead the way back down the hall as Vision picked up the bag to follow her, the remains of the flower he'd gifted her cupped gently in her palms and a bright smile on her face.

Vision was here with her. She and the others were safe and out of prison. The sun was shining and happiness was fluttering with a giddy excitement in her chest and for the first time in a rather long time, she actually felt safe enough and calm enough to relax.

Somehow, she knew...now that Vizh was here... everything was going to be okay.

* * *

 **Author's Note:** Merry Christmas, everyone! This brings our story to a close. Goodnight, all!


End file.
